UC-NRLF 


$B    7ES    bMfi 


of  the 


i»i»»mi»»iiiiiii.i 


BY  J.  LOREMZO  WEH!€H 


Yours  Truly 

J.  Lorenzo  Werich 


Pioneer  Hunters 
of  the  Kankakee 

BY 
J.  LORENZO  WERICM 


Copyright  1920 
By  J,  Lorenzo  Wcrich 
All  Rights  Reserved 


CONTENTS 


CHAriER 

PAGE 

I. 

Catching  /Ay  First  Raccoon 

9 

11. 

Finding  The  /Aissing  Link 

15 

III. 

Defeat  of  the  Pottowattomies 

21 

IV. 

Setting  Steel  Traps 

33 

V. 

Dividing  the  Game 

46 

VI. 

/Ay  First  Boat  f^ide 

62 

VII. 

Hunters  Who  Have  Buckfevered 

72 

Vlll. 

Trappers'  Claims 

85 

IX. 

Running  the  Ferry 

101 

X. 

Last  of  the  Pottowattomies 

108 

XI. 

Home  of  Chief  Killbuck 

122 

XII. 

Indian  Island 

131 

XIII. 

Grape  Island 

141 

XIV. 

Barrel-House  Blind 

150 

XV. 

Draining  the  Swamps 

174 

LIBRARY 


ILLUSTRATIONS 

J.  Lorenzo  Werich                      -                      -  Frontpiece 

Trapping  P\y  First  Raccoon                -                -  -              12 

Pioneer  Trapper's  Shanty  on  Little  Paradise  Island  -          38 

John  Werich            -               -               -               -  -             70 

A  Deer  Hunter's  Lodge  on  Johnson's  Island  -               73 

Eaton's  Bridge                -                   _            _                _  102 

Interior  View  of  Louisville  Club  House               -  -        107 

Louisville  Club  House                   _                   _  -          108 

In  Camp  on  Island  Six  to  Two                   -  -                129 

A  Typical  Trapper's  Shanty  on  Indian  Island  -              151 

The  Indian  Island  Saw  /Aill                    -                    "  134 

Ay  Island  Home  on  the  Kankakee                   -  -                135 

The  White  Star                   _                   _                    _  137 

Rockville.  Terre  Haute  &  Indianapolis  Club  House  -          139 

Ruins  of  a  Trapper's  Cabin  on  Grape  Island  -              143 
Some  of  the  Traps  That  Were  Used  by  Early  Hunters        -      146 

Ay  First  Duck  Shooting  from  a  Boat              -  -                150 

The  Old  River  Bed  at  North  Bend               -  -               186 

The  New  Kankakee                   _                   _  -               188 

Camp  of  Logansport  Hunters  on  Cornell's  Island  -           189 


^.  .'■j.'<-^<< 


•i''.  ■:•- « 


I —      »     i  — ^'' 


CONTENTS 


CHAI-IER 

PAGE 

I. 

Catching  /Ay  Pirst  Raccoon 

9 

11. 

Finding  The  /Aissing  Link 

15 

III. 

Defeat  of  the  Fottowattomies 

21 

IV. 

Setting  Steel  Traps 

33 

V. 

Dividing  the  Game 

46 

VI. 

/Ay  First  Boat  F^ide 

62 

VII. 

Hunters  Who  Have  BucHfevered 

72 

VIII. 

Trappers'  Claims 

85 

IX. 

Running  the  Ferry 

101 

X. 

Last  of  the  Fottowattomies 

108 

XI. 

Home  of  Chief  Killbuck 

122 

XII. 

Indian  Island 

131 

Xlll. 

Grape  Island 

141 

XIV. 

Barrel-Mouse  Blind 

150 

XV. 

Draining  the  Swamps 

174 

*«*]*  LiBRARY 


ILLUSTRATIONS 

J.  Lorenzo  Werich                      -                      -  Frontpiece 

Trapping  /^y  First  Raccoon                -                -  -              12 

Pioneer  Trapper's  Shanty  on  Little  Paradise  Island          -  38 

John  Werich            -                -                -                -  -              70 

A  Deer  Hunter's  Lodge  on  Johnson's  Island  -                73 

Eaton's  Bridge                -                   _            _  _                  102 

Interior  'View  of  Louisville  Club  House               -  -        107 

Louisville  Club  House                    _                   _  -          108 

In  Camp  on  Island  Six  to  Two                   -  -                129 

A  Typical  Trapper's  Shanty  on  Indian  Island  -              151 

The  Indian  Island  Saw  /^ill                   -                   "  134 

A\y  Island  Home  on  the  Kankahee                   -  -                135 

The  White  Star                   -                   -                     -  -     137 

Rockvllle.  Terre  Haute  &  Indianapolis  Club  House  -          139 

Ruins  of  a  Trapper's  Cabin  on  Grape  Island  -              143 
Some  of  the  Traps  That  Were  Used  by  Early  Hunters        -      146 

Ay  First  Duck  Shooting  from  a  Boat              -  -                150 

The  Old  River  Bed  at  North  Bend                -  -                186 

The  New  Kankakee                   _                   _  -               188 

Camp  of  Logansport  Hunters  on  Cornell's  Island  -           189 


'jf^^lj 


To 
The  Pioneer  Hunters  and  Trappers 
of  the  Kankakee  River  Region,  of  many  years 
of  faithful  friendship,  I  dedicate  this  volume. 

By  the  Author. 


CHAPTER  I 
CATCHING  MY  FIRST  RACCOON 

REMINISCENCES 

OF  PIONEER   DAYS  ON 

THE  OLD   KANKAKEE   RIVER 

CATCHING  MY  FIRST 

RACCOON 

"Oh  the  hunting  days  of  my  youth, 
Have  forever  gone  from  me." 

I  was  born  in  a  log  cabin  on  my  grandfather's 
farm  near  Valparaiso,  Indiana  in  1860,  and 
within  two  miles  and  a  half  of  the  historical 
stream  of  which  I  am  going  to  tell  you.  It  was 
whilst  watching  the  vanishing  of  a  great  hunting 
ground  by  the  reclaiming  of  the  Kankakee 
swamp  lands,  or  rather  making  a  new  Kanka- 
kee f^iver,  that  involves  the  plot  which  forms 
the  gist  of  my  story.  I  have  seen  the  sad  face 
of  th2  old  Pottowattomie  Indian  who  v/as  driven 


FiGNFF.R  HUNTERS  OF  THE  KANKAKEE 

from  his  hunting  grounds  on  the  Kankakee,  and 
now  we  see  a  shadow  of  gloom,  of  sadness,  on 
the  faces  of  the  fev/  remaining  old  pioneer  hunt- 
ers who  have  spent  their  early  years  in  hunting 
wild  game  and  trapping  the  fur-bearing  animals 
of  the  Kankakee  region. 

It  is  not  my  purpose  to  write  the  whole  history 
of  this  Kankakee  region  or  to  give  reminiscenses 
of  all  the  pioneer  hunters  that  have  hunted  and 
fished  on  the  Kankakee,  in  the  years  past,  as  it 
would  take  a  long  time  to  write  it,  and  it  would 
make  volumes. 

/Aany  hunters  have  come  here  from  far  off 
cities,  Nev/  York,  Philadephia,  V/ashington,  Bos- 
ton, Pittsburg,  and  many  near-by  cities.  1  have 
met  and  hunted  with  sportsmen  from  Europe, 
and  the  hunters  usually  get  what  they  are  look- 
for— plenty  of  game— as  it  was  the  best  hunting 
ground  for  all  kinds  of  game  birds  in  the  United 
States.  This  fact  I  know,  as  I  have  hunted  as 
far  north  as  I  could  and  yet  be  in  the  United 
States,  and  as  far  south  as  the  Gulf  of  Aexico, 

10 


CATCHING  MY  FIRST  RACCOON 
and  west  as  far  as  the  Rockies,  and  I  have  never 
yet  found  a  place  that  equalled  the  Kankakee 
swamps,  for  the  variety  of  game  to  be  found  there. 

To  make  a  long  story  short,  in  those  days  it 
was  the  hunters'  and  trappers'  paradise,  and  no 
wonder  he  now  feels  sad  at  heart  when  he  looks 
over  this  once  great  hunting-ground  nov/  the 
home  of  the  farmer.  He  can  realize  how  the 
Redman  felt  when  he  had  to  give  up  this  region 
to  the  white  hunters. 

V/hen  about  eight  years  of  age  v/e  moved  to 
the  marsh  and  lived  in  a  log  cabin  on  Bissel 
Ridge.  In  the  summer  season  my  father  ditched 
and  made  hay.  The  grass  v/as  cut  v/ith  a  scythe. 
After  being  cured  it  was  hauled  out  of  the  marsh 
on  a  brush  to  some  knoll  or  ridge  and  there 
stacked.  In  the  fall  father  trapped  the  fur-bearing 
animals  and  shot  game  for  meat,  while  tending 
his  traps.  He  would  dress  the  skins  at  night.  I 
helped  getting  the  bow-stretchers  ready  and  in 
stringing  the  dry  hides.  And  v/hen  snuffing  the 
candle,   no  lamps  or  electric  lights  v/ere  used  in 

11 


PIONEER  HUNTERS  OF  THE  KANKAKEE 

those  days,  I  would  sometimes  get  sleepy  and 
snuff  the  wick  a  little  too  low  and  put  the  light 
out.  A  few  yards  in  front  of  our  cabin  ran  a 
small  creek  that  spread  out  over  a  low  marsh, 
or  rather  a  slough,  as  they  are  sometimes  called, 
just  below  our  house.  This  formed  a  great 
musk-rat  pond  and  was  also  a  great  place  for 
wild  ducks  to  nest  and  rear  their  young.  About 
a  mile  above  our  cabin  was  another  musk-rat 
pond,  and  this  little  creek  was  its'  outlet,  mak- 
ing it  a  run-way  for  the  rats  from  one  pond  to 
another.  Father  gave  me  two  or  three  old  steel 
traps  which  had  weak  springs  and  which  I  could 
set  without  breaking  my  fingers,  should  they 
happen  to  get  caught  between  the  jaws.  I  set 
the  traps  along  the  creek  where  the  rats  would 
stop  to  feed  on  roots  and  such  vegetation  as 
musk-rats  usually  feed  upon.  1  caught  fifteen 
rats  that  fall.  One  morning  I  went  to  my  traps 
and  found  a  raccoon  in  one  of  them.  Ay  young- 
est sister  usually  went  with  me  to  the  traps  and 
she  was  with  me  this  morning.    To  say  we  were 

12 


Trapping  My  Firjt  Raccoon.        This  is  one  of  the  wild 
animals  that  dwell  on  the  edge  of  civilization  in  the  wilds  of 
the  Kankakf^e,  where  dwelled  the  author 


CATCHING  MY  FIRST  RACCOON 
frightened  would  be  putting  it  in  a  very  mild 
form.  We  iiad  nothing  to  kill  the  raccoon 
with,  and  would  probably  not  have  done  so  had 
we  something  with  which  to  do  it.  /Ay  sister  hav- 
ing more  courage  than  1,  stayed  and  watched 
the  coon  whilst  I  ran  back  home  for  mother- 
father  was  away  tending  to  his  traps— to  come 
and  help  kill  the  coon.  With  two  big  clubs  my 
mother  and  1  soon  had  fAr.  Coon's  eaithly  career 
ended.  It  has  been  more  than  a  half  century 
ago  since  this  happened.  I  have  hunted  and 
trapped  some  big  game  since  that  time,  but  never 
became  quite  so  excited  as  on  the  morning 
v/hen  I  caught  the  first  raccon. 

ihe  scene  that  morning  will  be  forever  photo- 
graphed on  the  tablets  of  my  memory.  It  was 
.  at  this  place  I  lived  when  1  began  my  early  hunt- 
mg,  commencing  to  realize  the  pleasure  it  af- 
forded me.  But  of  course  I  had  no  idea  of  the 
hardships  which  existed  in  it.  We  resided  here 
about  two  years  and  a  half.  In  the  meantime 
my  father  bought  the  Bissel  stock,  consisting   of 

13 


PIONEER  HUNTERS  OF  THE  KANKAKEE 
two-fifths  of  the  stock  in  the  Indian  Island  Saw- 
mill Company.  /Ay  grandfather  owned  five 
one-hundred  dollar  shares  of  stock  in  the  saw- 
mill company.  This  he  gave  to  my  mother. 
Our  next  move  was  to  the  Indian  Island  where 
I  spent  the  next  ten  years  of  my  boy-hood  days. 
I  will  tell  you  more  in  another  chapter. 


14 


CHAPTER  II 

FINDING  THK   MISSING  LINK 

THE   DISCOVERY 

OF   THE   KANKAKEE   BY 

LASALLE,  A    FUR   TRADER    MEETING 

THE   POTTOWATTOMIE  INDIANS  AND 

FINISHING   THE   MISSING   LINK 

Look  at  the  map  of  Indiana  and  you  will  see, 
up  in  the  left-hand  corner  of  the  State,  a  small 
stream  rising  in  the  southern  part  of  St.  Joseph 
county,  which  flows  in  a  south-western  direction 
and  drains  the  counties  of  LaPorte,  Starke,  Por- 
ter, Jasper,  Lake  and  Newton.  It  is  also  the 
boundary  line  between  the  counties  I  have  men- 
tioned. Years  ago  the  Kankakee  was  called 
the  eastern  branch  of  the  Illinois  river,  but  that 
theme  has  been  disproved.  The  Indian  name 
of  the  Kankakee,  from  the  two  words  "The-Ak 
(wolf)   and   "A-Ki(iand)    literally    means   Wolf- 

15 


PIONEER  HUNTERS  OF  THE  KANKAKEE 
Land  River,  from  the  fact  that  many  years  ago 
a  band  of  Indians  of  the  Aohican  Tribe  who  cal- 
led themselves  "wolves"  when  driven  from  their 
homes    by    the   Iroquois,   took    refuge   on   its 
banks  near  the  headwaters  of  the  The-A-Ki-Ki. 
Charlevoix,  the  French  missionary,  on  his  voy- 
age down  the  Kankakee   river   in  1721.  speaks 
of  the  wolves.     It  was   from   some   of  these  of 
Indians,  whose  village  was  a  few  miles  from  the 
south  bend  on  the  St.  Joe  river,  and  where  now 
stands  the  city  of  South  Bend,  that  the  mission- 
ary recFuited  his  force  for  his   expedition   down 
the   Kankakee,   the  Illinois,  and  the  /Mississippi 
rivers.     The  Kankakee   is   the   most   historical 
River  in  the  state.    Yet  there  is  very  little  known 
of  its  early  history,  only  that  the  numerous  wild 
animals  which    made   this    region   their   home 
made  the  Kankakee   an   important   fur-trading 
country.     Occasionally  a  hunter's  story  of  see- 
ing or  shooting  a  deer  or  wild-cat  in  the  Kanka- 
kee swamps  is  read  in   the   newspapers.     The 
river  itself,  though  not  a  long   one,   is   beautiful, 

16 


FINDING  THE  MJSSING  LINK 
winding  through  marshes,  forests,  and  long  tan- 
gled vines,  among  its  wooded  islands,  with  here 
and  there  there   an   opening   in   the   forest.     It 
spreads  its  channel  for  miles  and  in  many  places 
becomes  a  lonely,  lily-fringed  lake.      Its  bed  in 
the  sand  and  clay  forms  its  course  to  within  a  few 
miles   of     A\omence,  Illinois,   where    the    rock 
crops   out   and  forms  a   great   dam  across  the 
stream.     This  dam  was   partly   removed  a-  few 
years   ago   at   a   cost  of  seventy-five  thousand 
dollars.      The   Kankakee   region   was   once   a 
heavy  timbered  country,  but  the  forest  fires  have 
greatly   reduced   its   wood   districts.     The   lofty 
sycamore  and  the  mammoth  elm  are  still  to   be 
found  on  the  banks  of  the    Kankakee,    as  they 
were   during   the  time  when  the  fur-laden  boats 
of  the  French   glided   down   the   river.     In   the 
early  history  of  this  continent  it  was  the  custom 
of  Spanish  explorers   to   give    it   some   special 
geographical  features  by  naming  the  place  they 
discovered  after  some  Saint  in  a  church-calen- 
der, the  day  the  discovery  was   made,     in    this 

17 


PIONEiiR  HUNTERS  OF  THE  KANKAKEE 
manner  it  was  no  trouble  to  trace  the  exact 
course  of  these  explorers  along  the  coast  of  the 
continent.  It  was  not  so  with  the  French.  And 
for  this  reason  many  notes  of  historical  interest, 
of  the  early  discoveries  made  by  the  French 
have  never  been  written  in  history.  Early  in  the 
fall  of  1679,  LaSalle  left  the  vessel  at  Green 
Bay  and  coasted  the  shore  of  Lake  /Michigan 
until  he  arrived  at  the  mouth  of  the  St, 
Joseph  river.  Here  he  built  Fort  LaSalle 
and  stayed  here  most  all  that  winter  on  account 
of  the  ice,  to  await  the  arrival  of  Tonti,  an  Italian 
officer  whom  he  had  brought  with  him  from 
France  as  his  lieutenant.  There  were  about  forty 
in  all  as  they  left  Ft.  LaSalle  early  in  the  spring, 
As  soon  as  the  ice  had  gone  out  of  the  river  they 
ascendedthe  St.  Joseph  river  as  far  as  the  south 
bend  about  eighty  miles,  then  encamped  for  a 
time  to  await  the  remainder  of  the  party,  which 
arrived  in  a  few  days.  Then  they  took  portage 
across  the  swamps  to  the  headwaters  of  the 
'The-A-Ki-F<.i."  (Kankakee.) 

18 


FINDING  THE  MISSING  LINK 
It   was  LaSalle's  plan  and  idea,  when  he  left 
France  and  sailed  from  his  home  in  Rouen   to 
the  French  possessions  in  Canada,  to  accumu- 
late a  fortune  by  trading  European  merchandise 
to  the  Indians  for  their  furs  and  pelts  which  they 
got  along  the  lakes  and  northern    rivers.     With 
this  object  in  view  he  explored  many  lakes  and 
rivers  in  what  is  now  Indiana,  and  established 
trading  posts  on  the  frontier.     After  establishing 
trading    posts,  as  1   have  said  before,    LaSalle 
traded   with  the   Indians   such  articles  of  mer- 
chandise as  guns,  ammunition,  knives,  hatchets, 
kettles,  blankets  and  beads  in  exchange  for  their 
valuable  furs.     This  was  the  motto  of  the  Indian 
"You   Can   Do   Ae   Good— I    Do   You    Good." 
The  Indians  soon  learned  that  tlie   Frenchman 
was  a  benefactor  and  not  an  enemy,    therefore 
in  a  few  years  they  were  carrying  on  a  big  fur 
trade  with  the  Indians  on  the  northwest  frontier. 
Tradition  tells   us  that   every  wigv/am  in  those 
days  v/elcomed  the  visit  of  a  Frenchman.    Hav- 
ing carried  out  his  plans  so  far  successfully,  this 

19 


PIONEER  HUNTERS  OF  THE  KANKAKEE 
celebrated  explorer  had  another  object  in  view. 
This  was  to  find  the  link. which  connected  the 
great  inland  seas  of  the  north  with  the  waters  of 
the  gulf  in  the  south.  He  had  heard  of  that 
wonderful  river,  "'The  father  of  Waters."  which 
flowed  from  tne  unexplored  wilderness  in  the 
north  far  away  into  the  unknown  Sunny  South. 
With  this  object  before  him  he  set  out  on  an  ex- 
ploring expedition  to  find  a  shorter  way  that 
would  shorten  the  world's  commerce  between 
the  East  and  the  West  and  to  his  idea  he  had 
found  the  missing  link  which  is  our  ov/n  Kanka- 
kee river. 


20 


CHAPTER  ill 
THE  MIAMI  CONFEDKRACY 

THE   DEFEAT 

OF    THE    POTTOWATTOMIES 

AT    THE   BATTLE  OF   TIPPECANOE 

WHICH     FOREVER     SHATTERED     THE 

STRONGHOLD     OF      THE 

MIAMI    CONFEDERACY 

In  1881  I  made  a  trip  to  the  Indian  territory 
and  the  Pottowattomie  reservation  in  Kansas. 
1  visited  several  tribes  of  Indians,  at  that  time 
the  Indian  affairs  were  under  the  control  of  the 
Pederal  Government.  The  purpose  of  my  visit 
was  to  find,  if  possible,  any  of  the  old  Pottowat- 
tomie Indians  that  at  one  time  inhabited  the 
Kankakee  region,  that  I  might  be  able  to  learn 
more  of  the  early  history  of  their  hunting  grounds 
on  the  Kankakee  river.  1  found  two  very  old 
Pottowattomies  that  claimed  to  have  lived  and 
hunted  on  the  Kankakee  river  in  their  early  days. 

21 


PIONEER  HUNTERS  OF  THE  KANKAKEE 
You  can  not  tell  how  old  an  Indian  is  by  his 
looks  unless  you  are  acquainted  with  his  habits, 
but  they  are  octogenarians.  At  any  rate  they 
gave  accounts  of  events  that  had  actually  hap- 
pened when  and  where  treaties  had  been  made. 
When  1  spoke  of  the  great  tragedy  at  Fort  Dear- 
born one  of  the  old  warriors  arose  to  his  feet, 
threw  a  blanket  around  him  and  began  to  pace 
to  and  fro;  finally  he  said  in  a  saddened  voice 
that  he  was  there.  1  drew  from  him  some  facts 
that  I  never  before  had  heard.  He  told  how 
they  felt  when  /Aajor  Irwin  passed  through  the 
Kankakee  swamps,  notifying  them  to  be  ready 
to  start  for  their  new  home  beyond  the  /Aisssis- 
sippi  river.  1  obtained  much  valuable  informa- 
tion from  those  two  old  warriors.  One  of  them 
then  was  a  young  warrior  of  seventeen  summers. 
He  was  with  Elskwat-awa,  the  Prophet,  when 
they  sent  Winamac  down  the  Wabash  river  to 
Vincennes  where  they  went  in  council  circle 
with  Gen.  Harrison.  Later  they  both  fought  and 
were   survivors   of    the    Battle   of   Tippecanoe, 

22 


THE  DEFEAT  OF  THE  POT TOWOTTOMIES 

which  forever  shattered  the  stronghold  of  the 
/Aiami  Confederacy.  Me  told  how  the  army 
was  encamped  on  a  tract  of  marsh  land  near 
the  river,  in  the  shape  of  a  flat-iron,  how  they 
were  defeated.  There  were  two  men,  one  white 
and  the  other  a  redrnan,  who  v/orked  with  all 
energy  to  defeat  the  scheme  of  Tecumseh  and 
Els-kwat-awa.  These  were  General  Harrison 
and  the  chief,  Winamac.  The  former  sent  con- 
stant messengers  from  among  French  settlers 
of  the  territory  through  all  this  Kankakee  region, 
counseling  peace,  and  hoped  tlirough  their 
strength  and  influence  to  disarm  all  hostile  feel- 
ings. At  the  same  time  the  latter,  one  of  the 
noblest  of  his  race,  devoted  all  his  efforts  to  se- 
curing peace,  Sometimie  in  /Aay,  18H,  a  large 
number  of  the  Pottowattomies  from  this  region 
assembled  at  a  place  called  the  "Cov/  Pasture" 
on  the  St.  Joseph  River,  and  were  only  prevent- 
ed from  joining  the  followers  of  Tecumseh  and 
the  Open-Door  by  the  pleading  eloquence  of 
the   venerable   Winamac.      A  few  months  later 

23 


PIONEER  HUNTERS  OF  THE  KANKAKEE 
Tecumseh  departed  for  the  South  to  solicit  aid 
of  other  tribes  to  develop  his  scheme  for  a  great 
confederacy,  While  he  was  gone  Open  Door 
sent  out  messengers  to  the  Pottowattomie's 
lands,  calling  upon  the  natives  to  join  his  forces. 
A  large  number  of  the  inhabitants  of  the  Kanka- 
kee region  formed  in  line  of  march  and  passed 
down  through  the  prairie  marshes  to  the  Potto- 
wattomie  Ford,  crossed  the  Kankakee,  then  on 
through  to  the  Prophet's  town.  Winamac  was 
sent  to  Governor  Harrison  with  a  message  of 
peace.  This  is  where  the  crafty  Prophet  got  in 
his  deceitful  work  and  was  now  free  to  effect  his 
purpose.  As  preparation  was  made  for  the  war 
the  women  and  children  were  sent  to  the  North 
for  safety.  /Aany  were  hidden  in  caves  in  the 
sand  hills  along  the  Tippecanoe  River  near 
where  the  City  of  Winamac  now  stands.  Others 
came  in  large  numbers  to  the  Kankakee  swamps 
and  remained  hidden  in  its  recesses  to  await  the 
tide  of  war.  Hundreds  of  defenseless  women 
and  children  thronged  to  the  shores  of  our  his- 

24 


THE  DEFEAT  OF  THE  PO  rVOWOTTOM  IKS 
toric  river  and  waited  many  weary  days  of 
watching  and  long  nights  of  pain  from  hunger 
and  fatigue  for  the  return  of  the  braves,  many  of 
whom  were  never  to  come.  The  result  of  the 
Battle  of  Tippecanoe  is  well  known.  The  be- 
trayed and  defeated  Pottowattomies  returned  to 
their  homes.  Aany  regretted  that  act  against 
ihe  whites  whilst  many  others  were  incited  by 
the  crafty  British  to  a  desire  for  revenge  and 
here  was  laid  the  plot  for  another  great  tragedy, 
the  doom  of  Fort  Dearborn.  Less  than  tv/o 
years  after  their  defeat  at  the  Battle  of  Tippe- 
canoe, the  garrison  at  Fort  Dearborn  was  at- 
tached and  three-fourths  of  their  number  killed. 
The  survivors  surrendered  with  the  promise  of 
their  captors  to  spare  their  lives.  This  promise 
was  broken.  Captain  Wells'  horse  was  shot 
from  under  him.  As  he  fell  an  Indian  ran  up 
and  stabbed  him  in  the  back  and  he  died  in  the 
arms  of  his  Fottowattomie  friends.  The  history 
of  the  Fort  Dearborn  massacre  is  one  of  the 
saddest    Indian  tragedies  of  the  Fottowattomie 

,      25 


PIONEER  HUNTFCRS  OF  THE  KANKAKEE 
lands  that  was  ever  placed  on  the  pages  of  his- 
tory. We  will  ship  a  period  of  eight  years  over 
Pottowattomie  land.  No  events  of  any  great 
importance  occured  then.  Indian  Territory  be- 
came a  State,  Fort  Dearborn  v/as  again  garri- 
soned. The  French  held  the  ascendancy  in 
influence  in  this  region  and  were  held  in  the 
highest  regard  by  the  Indians.  In  1821  the 
white  hunters  began  to  come  to  the  Kankakee 
region.  The  day  before  General  Harrison  start- 
ed on  his  march  up  the  Wabash  to  meet  the 
Prophet,  two  young  men  volunteered  to  join  the 
army,  by  the  names  of  Daniel  Scott  and  Aike 
Haskins.  They  had  a  cousin  in  the  army,  an 
officer  named  Atwood,  who  was  wounded  at  the 
Battle  of  Tippecanoe.  Having  a  broken  leg,  he 
was  picked  up  and  carried  away  to  the  Kanka- 
kee swamps,  about  sixty  miles  distant,  and  was 
cared  for  by  a  squaw,  taking  the  place  of  her 
son  who  had  been  killed.  In  1821  Scott  and 
Haskins  came  north  to  the  Kankakee  region  in 
search  of  their  lost  relative.     As   there   was  a 

26 


THE  DEFEAT  Ox^^  THE  POTTOWOITOMIKS 
large  estate  to  be  settled  back  in  Ohio  it  v/as 
necessary  to  know  his  ^^'hereabouts.  Scott  and 
liaskins  made  every  effort  to  find  him  alive,  if 
they  could,  or  where  he  v/as  buried  if  possible- 
They  brought  with  them  such  trinkets  as  the 
Indians  usually  wants,  such  as  pipes,  tobacco, 
knives,  needles,  etc.  They  got  in  with  the  na- 
tives by  giving  them  these  goods  for  very  little 
or  nothing.  By  kindness  they  gained  their 
friendship.  Scott  opened  a  store  at  Bengaul  but 
when  the  English  come  they  called  it  Tass- 
naugh.  This  was  the  first  trading  post  in  this 
region  and  was  an  ancient  village  v/hen  the 
French  had  established  a  trading  post  in  long 
years  past,  before  even  the  Pottowattomie  re- 
volt. It  was  on  the  old  Pottowattomie  trail  lead- 
ing from  the  Kankakee  River  to  the  Lakes.  In 
the  early  summer,  after  the  hunting  season  was 
over  for  the  fur  bearing  animals,  the  Indians 
would  pack  their  furs,  then  with  their  women 
and  children  they  would  start  north  for  the  lakes 
to  meet  the  French  fur  trading  boats  which  came 

27 


PIONEER  HUNTERS  OF  THE  KANKAKEE 
down  to  the  lower  lake  region  to  trade  with 
them  for  their  furs.  During  the  summer  season 
they  fished  and  picked  berries,  as  these  were 
what  they  lived  on  mostly  during  the  heated 
seasons,  in  the  fall  they  would  return  to  the 
Kankakee  hunting  grounds  where  one  of  their 
main  camps  was  located  on  a  long  point  of  the 
mainland  or  ridge  that  projected  far  out  into  the 
swamp  and  near  the  mouth  of  Sandy  Hook. 
This  place  was  known  as  "Indian  Garden"  and 
hundreds  of  Indians  camped  there  during  the 
hunting  seasons.  There  was  another  Indian 
camping  ground  a  few  miles  below  this  on  the 
same  side  of  the  river  known  as  the  "Indian  Is- 
land," and  of  which  1  will  speak  later  on.  Scott 
having  his  store  on  this  old  Indian 'trail  brought 
him  face  to  face  with  hundreds  of  Pottov/atto- 
mies,  while  fiaskins  camped  and  hunted  for 
nearly  two  years  and  was  the  first  v/hite  hunter 
to  camp  on  Indian  island.  Scott  sold  his  store 
to  a  Frenchman,  then  he  and  liaskins  returned 
to  the  East.        They  never  heard  or  got  trace  of 

28 


THE  DEFEAT  OF  THE  POTTOWOTTOMIES 
their  lost  relative,  As  I  have  said  before  im- 
mense fortunes  were  now  made  by  trading  with 
the  Indians  in  all  parts  of  this  country.  Early  in 
1821  two  men  acting  in  this  capacity  became 
well  known  and  remarkable  for  their  v/ealth  and 
influence  through  all  the  Kankakee  country. 
They  were  Joseph  Bailie  and  Pierre  F.  Navarre. 
As  there  is  usually  in  these  early  time  stories  a 
little  love  and  romance,  this  is  what  happened 
to  these  men.  In  accordance  with  the  general 
custom  among  traders  both  married  daughters 
of  native  chieftans.  After  a  time  Bailie  settled 
on  the  prairie  north  of  the  river  in  what  after- 
wards was  Porter  county,  and  near  the  site  of 
where  Valparaiso  now  stands.  The  place  was 
called  Baily  Town  and  is  still  a  well-known 
point  in  Porter  county.  Navarre  settled  at 
/Michigan  City  for  a  time  and  then  moved  to  the 
banks  of  the  St.  Joseph  River.  fAr.  Bailie,  or 
Bailly  as  he  was  generally  called,  was  a  native 
of  Prance.  It  was  in  1822  that  he  first  settled 
in  Bailly  Town  and  for  the  next  eleven  years  he 

29 


PIONEER  HUNTERS  OF  THE  KANKAKEE 
was  the  only  white  man  within  the  country 
limits.  His  family  consisted  of  a  wife  and  four 
daughters.  As  the  years  passed  by  he  became 
very  wealthy,  so  much  so  that  he  purchased  a 
sloop  and  was  thus  enabled  to  take  his  children 
east  to  give  them  the  advantage  of  a  thorough 
education  and  culture.  Eleanor,  the  oldest,  took 
the  veil  and  was  for  many  years  Aother  Super- 
ior of  St.  Aary's  School  at  Terre  Haute,  Indiana. 
There  have  been  many  treaties  made  with  the 
Fottowattomies.  one  made  in  1832  and  one  in 
1836.  By  the  former  treaties  the  Fottowatto- 
mies conceded  to  the  United  States  all  the 
country  situated  between  the  mouth  of  the  Tip- 
pecanoe f^iver,  running  up  the  river  twenty-five 
miles,  thence  to  the  Wabash  river,  thence  across 
to  the  Vermillion  river.  This  was  known  as  the 
St.  /Aary's  Treaty.  By  this  treaty  the  Kankakee 
region  formed  a  part  of  the  domain  of  the  Fot- 
towattomie  Indians,  although  they  were  of  the 
/Miami's  Confederacy  and  the  Aiamis  claimed 
the  land  by  right  of  occupancy.     The  Pottowat- 

30 


THE  DEFEAT  OP^  THE  POTTOWOTTOM  lES 
tomies  held  possession  when  the  whites  began 
to  settle  the  country  and  it  was  with  them  that 
the  United  States  government  treatied  in  1836. 
The  remainder  of  the  territory  now  was  on  the 
Pickamick  and  Kankakee  rivers.  The  Aiamis 
held  claim  to  all  the  territory  in  the  northwest 
part  of  the  State.  By  the  terms  of  the  second 
and  last  treaty  the  Fottowattomics  ceded  all 
their  lands  to  the  United  States  Government  and 
agreed  to  relinquish  the  territory  when  called  up- 
on to  do  so.  This  was  called  the  /^\ississinawa 
Treaty  and  was  made  on  the  treaty  grounds 
near  the  headwaters  of  the  Kankakee.  The 
Pottowattomies  left  the  Kankakee  swamps  for 
their  new  home  toward  the  Sunset,  to  the  land 
that  was  given  them  for  their  own  and  was 
theirs  as  long  as  the  sun  shines  and  the  rain 
falls.  But  their  Great  Pather  at  Washington 
changed  his  mind  and  a  few  years  later  they 
were  removed  to  the  Indian  Territory,  The  War 
Department  allowed  a  few  to  remain,  those  who 
had  distinguished  themselves  as  friends  to  the 

31 


PIONEER  HUNTERS  OF  THE  KANKAKEE 
whites  during  the  early  Indian  troubles.  In  1836 
a  man  by  the  name  of  Robinson,  of  French  and 
Indian  nationality,  was  the  chief  feader,  and  had 
absolute  control  over  all  the  Pottowattomies 
from  the  year  of  1825.  In  1836  he  assembled 
his  tribes  to  the  number  of  five  thousand  near 
Chicago  for  the  last  time,  fie  was  known  to 
his  people  as  Chief  Che-Bing-Way.  I  have 
thus  presented  an  account  of  the  Pottowatto- 
mie's  land  as  it  appeared  at  the  time  of  the 
whites  immigration  to  this  region. 


32 


CHAPTER  IV 
SETTING  STEEL  TRAPS 

THE  WHITE  MAN  SETTLING 
THE  COUNTRY  VACATED  BY  THE  INDIANS 
AND  THE  FIRST  TRAPPER  TO  SET 
STEEL  TRAPS  ON  THE  KANKAKEE 

The  history  of  the  region  of  the  Kankakee 
country  under  the  Aborignies  is  told.  The  great 
/"Aiami  Republic  fell  before  the  Republic  of  the 
East,  and  it  became  the  obvious  destiny  of  the 
nations  to  yield  to  the  strongest  race.  The  year 
"33"  marked  the  advent  of  the  first  white  fami- 
lies from  the  East.  The  first  settlers  to  arrive 
were  the  Aorgan  Brothers,  Isaac  and  William, 
who  came  early  in  the  summer  from  Wayne 
County'  Ohio,  and  settled  on  a  prairie,  after- 
wards known  as  AVorgan  Prairie.  It  is  on  the 
cast  side  of  Sandy  Hook  and  a  few   miles   from 

33 


THE  PIONEER  HUNTERS  OF  THE  KANKAKEE 
the   Kankakee   river.       Two  years    later    my 
Grandfather  Dye   came   from  Holmes  County, 
Ohio,  and  settled  on  a  prairie  on  the  west   side 
of  Sandy  Hook,  which  is  now   known  as   Horse 
Prairie,    He  was  the  first  white  settler  in  what  is 
now  Boone  township.      /Ay  mother  at  that  time 
was  only  five  years  of  age  and  she  remembers 
seeing  many  of  the  Fottowattomies.      Her  arri- 
val in  the  Kankakee  country  antedating  that  of 
my   father   is  more   than  fifteen  years.     In  the 
next   decade   many  settlers  were  found  in  this 
part  of  the  country.      Game  was  plentiful  and  in 
every  cabin  was   found   a   rifle  or  two.     From 
some  of  these  pioneer  homes  came  the   early 
hunters  and  trappers  of  this  story.     Hence,  "The 
Pfoneer  Hunters  of  the  Kankakee"  is  the  title  of 
my   story.     In  the  outset  of  this   story  I  had  in 
mind  only  a  short  story  of  the  early  trappers  and 
hunters.     But   I   have   detoured  out  over  more 
territory  than  I  expected.     If  I   were   to  give   a 
graphic  sketch  of  all  the  men  who  have  hunted 
and  trapped  on  the  Kankakee  it  would  fill   vol- 

34 


SETTING  STEEL  TKAPS 
umes.  Therefore  I  will  speak  only  of  a  few  of 
the  earliest  pioneers.  As  I  have  said  fur  traders 
in  those  early  days  became  immensely  rich  and 
the  Kankakee  Region  in  an  early  day  was  the 
greatest  hunting  ground  in  the  /Aiddle  West, 
especially  for  the  fur-beaFing  animals.  As  gold 
and  gems  was  the  magnet  that  attracted  our 
Hoosier  folks  to  the  Far  West,  so  it  was  the  fur 
trade  that  brought  the  early  explorers  to  the 
Kankakee  region.  The  Indians  caught  the  furs 
and  traded  them  to  the  new-comers  for  trinkets. 
Then  began  the  greatest  trade  that  this  part  of 
Indiana  ever  knew.  New  types  of  persons  were 
brought  into  existence  in  the  new  country  by 
the  new  trade  and  it  is  some  of  these  I  am  go- 
ing to  tell  you  about  in  this  new  story,  as  the 
history  of  the  Kankakee  fur  trade  is  one  of  the 
brightest  pages  of  its  history.  In  the  fall  of  "45" 
Harrison  Hartz  Polsom  and  Rens  Brainard,  two 
young  men  came  from  Ohio  with  their  parents. 
In  1840  they  settled  on  the  prairie  north  of  the 
Kankakee  Swamp.     Having   some   idea    how 

35 


PIONEER  HUNTERS  OF  THE  KANKAKEE 
profitable  a  business  it  was  trapping  tlie  fur- 
bearing  animals,  they  embarked  in  that  busi- 
ness. First  each  of  them  made  a  butter-nut 
dugout.  Then  they  wenl  to  a  blacksmith  by  the 
name  of  Alyes  who  had  settled  in  this  region  in 
the  early  "30"  and  had  opened  a  blacksmith 
shop  on  his  homestead,  and  who  also  kept  a 
cross-road  store  a  few  miles  east  of  the  Indian 
Town,  now  Hebron,  and  engaged  him  to  make 
them  three  dozen  steel  rat-traps  at  one  dollar 
each,  and  four  two-spring  otter  traps,  or  wolf 
traps  as  they  are  sometimes  called,  at  three  dol- 
lars each.  These  were  the  first  steel  traps  made 
and  set  in  the  Kankakee  country.  On  the  first 
of  October  they  launched  their  dugouts  and 
trapping  outfit  off  Coal  Pitt  Island,  a  small  island 
in  the  north  marsh  where  for  many  years  Jones 
and  Smith  had  their  charcoal  pits.  They  pad- 
dled their  dugouts  up  the  marsh  along  the  tim- 
ber line  until  they  came  to  North  Bend.  In  the 
early  days  it  was  called  Flag  Pond  but  was 
known  to  the  old  river  men  as  North  Bend  from 

36 


SETTING  STEEL  TRAPS 
the  fact  that  at  this  point  the  Kankakee  flows 
the  farthest  north  of  its  entire  course.  At  this 
point  there  is  an  opening  through  the  timber  to 
the  river.  They  ascended  the  river  a  few  miles. 
When  night  came  upon  them  they  landed  on  a 
small  ridge  near  the  mouth  of  Crooked  Creek. 
They  soon  had  a  frail  camp  and  a  glowing  camp 
fire.  When  they  landed  on  the  ridge  Brainard 
shot  two  young  fox  squirrels  and  with  what  pro- 
visions they  had  brought  with  them  they  soon 
had  a  good  supper.  After  supper  they  gathered 
up  some  withered  herbage,  spread  their  blankets 
and  lay  down  for  a  night's  rest  in  the  lone,  si- 
lent, solitary,  stillness  of  the  Kankakee  swamps, 
to  be  lured  to  sleep  by  the  hoot-owl,  the  howl- 
ing of  the  wolves  and  the  splashing  of  the  musk- 
rats  in  the  water  near  the  camp.  This  was  the 
first  night's  experience  of  two  of  the  oldest  trap- 
pers in  years  of  service  on  the  Kankakee.  On 
the  following  day  they  set  out  their  traps  and 
looked  for  a  suitable  place  to  build  their  shanty. 
/*Vr.  Folsom  took  part  of  the  traps  and   went  up 

37 


PIONEER  HUNTERS  OF  THE  KANKAKEE 
the  river.  Brainard  took  the  remainder  and 
went  down  stream.  They  returned  to  camp  in 
the  afternoon  and  reported  their  trip  and  pros- 
pect of  a  building  site.  Brainard  had  found  a 
beautiful  small  island  near  the  river  on  a  bayou 
which  he  thought  would  be  a  very  suitable  spot 
for  a  shanty.  Folsom.  on  his  hunt  up  stream, 
had  found  the  material  to  build  the  shanty.  He 
had  found  an  old  wigwam  made  of  puncheon 
and  barks,  v/ell  dried  and  smoked.  In  a  short 
time  they  had  a  cozy  little  trappers'  shanty  on 
an  island  they  named  "Little  Paradise,"  which 
is  yet  known  by  that  name  today.  This  was 
the  first  American  trapper's  shanty  on  the  Kan- 
kakee that  I  have  any  knowledge  of.  There 
were  a  few  French  huts  and  traders'  shanties 
along  the  borders  of  the  swamp  regions  for  the 
purpose  of  trading  and  trafficing  with  the  Indians 
and  the  early  hunters.  Twenty  years  prior  to 
the  building  of  the  shanty  on  Paradise  Island 
the  fall  catch  of  furs  at  Little  Paradise  proved  a 
success,     The   sale   of   furs   brought  something 

38 


«        n        > 


-      -      >        "  »        > 


Pioneer  Trapper's  Shanty  on   Little  Paradise  Island,  where 
the  first  steel  traps  were  set  on  the  Kankakee  in  1845 


SETTING  STEEL  TRAPS 
over  one  hundred  and  twenty-five  dollars.   They 
invested  part  of  the  money  in  more  traps  and  In 
the   following  winter   built   a  shanty   on   Little 
Beach    fridge   in   which  they  shantied  for  four 
seasons.     On  this  ridge  they   found   a   hunter's 
shanty  occupied  by  a  man    named    Ritter,   who 
had  built  it  the  year  before,  in    1846.      In   1851 
Folso-ra  and  Brainard  buiit  a   shanty   on   Long 
Ridge  which  they  used  until  1866.     Then  they 
sold   out   and   left   Long   Ridge.     Folsom  then 
went   into    partnership    with  William   Granger^ 
They   built   a   cabin   on  Red  Oak.     This  cabin 
was   burned    in    "73."       They  rebuilt  it  the  fol- 
lowing year  and  used  it  until  he  retired  from  the 
trapping  business  in   1883,  having  spent  a  third 
of  a  century  in  the  Kankakee  swamps.       Uncle 
Marl  Seymour,  as  he  was  called,  who  had  been 
with  him  for  many  years,  continued  trapping  the 
Red  Oak  ground  until  old  age   compelled  him 
to  quit.       He  left  his  island  home  on  the  Kan- 
kakee and  spent  the  remaining  years  of  his  life 
at  the  home  of  P\r.  Polsom  at  Hebron,  Indiana. 

39 


PIONEER  HUNTERS  OF  THE  KANKAKEE 
Brainard,  v/ho  was  with  f-olsom  on  his    early 
expeditions  on  the  river   and  when  he  sold  out 
on  Long  I^idge,  built  a  shanty  on  Grape  Island, 
whare  he  trapped  for  several  years.       Then  he 
trapped   the   Little   Beach  ground  for  three  or 
four  years.     Finally  he  quit  trapping  altogether 
about  thirty  years  ago.       Folsom  and  Brainard 
were  the  pioneer   trappers   who  first   sat   steel 
traps  on  the  Kankakee  River  over  seventy-five 
years  ago,     The  next  decade  found  many  hunt- 
ers and  trappers  along  the    Kankakee  swamps. 
In  the  fall  of  1847    Aose  Summers   and   John 
Dusenberg  glided  down  the  winding  Kankakee 
in  skiffs  with  a   trapping   outfit   and   landed   at 
Long  Ridge,  built  a  shanty  which  v/as   the   first 
trapper's  shanty  on  the  Ridge.       They  used  this 
shanty   for   a  number  of  years.     Leaving  Long 
Ridge  they  shantied  on  a  number  of  islands  be- 
tween English    Lake   and   /Aomence,    Illinois. 
This  same  year  Joel  GfJson  built  a  log  shanty  on 
Long  Ridge  and  followed  the  trapping   business 
for   many   years.      He   had   two  sons  who  also 

40 


SETTING  STEEL  TRAPS 
were  trappers  and  trapped  many  years  after 
their  father  had  retired.  There  was  another  old 
time  hunter  whose  locks  were  as  white  as  the 
driven  snow  when  I  first  knew  him.  He  had 
settled  on  Long  Ridge  in  the  Fall  of  1838,  and 
dug  a  cave  in  the  side  of  the  Ridge  where  he 
lived  for  many  years.  Fifty  years  ago  this  old 
hunter  was  known  as  Uncie  Frank  Sweny.  lie 
was  the  oldest  residential  hunter  and  trapper  on 
the  "river,  having  commenced  hunting  on  the 
Kankakee  as  early  as  1833.  V/illiam  Bissell, 
one  of  thepioneer  settlers  of  Forter  county,  spent 
much  time  hunting  on  the  Kankakee  in  the 
early  days.  In  the  early  Fall  of  1847  Heck 
Goodridge  and  his  brother  John  built  a  shanty 
on  French  Island.  This  was  the  first  American 
trapper's  shanty.  The  French  and  Indian 
hunters  had  settled  on  this  island  many  years 
before  the  arrival  of  the  Qoodridges  and  from 
whence  it  derived  its  name.  I  will  give  more  of 
its  early  history  later  on.  In  1852  John  Broady 
an  early  pioneer  of  this  region,   began   trepping 

41 


PIONEER  HUNTERS  OF  THE  KANKAKEE 
on  Sandy  Hook,  also  he  trapped  the  Crooked 
Creek  Claim.  Later  on  he  owned  the  Indian 
Garden  trapping  ground  which  he  sold  to  Sam- 
uel Irvin  in  the  early  seventies.  A\r.  Broady 
was  a  very  successful  hunter  and  trapper  '  He 
never  trapped  any  after  selling  out  his  claims 
but  continued  hunting  on  the  Kankakee  up  to 
the  time  of  his  death  which  occured  in  1878 
from  a  severe  cold  from  the  effects  of  getting  wet 
by  falling  through  the  ice  in  a  bayou,  on  a  very 
cold  day  whilst  hunting  deer,  A\r.  Broady  was 
widely  -  known  as  a  deer  hunter,  having  led 
many  hunting  parties  through  the  swamps  in 
those  early  days.  It  was  about  this  time  that 
my  father  came  to  the  Kankakee  region  and  for 
many  years  he  and  /Ar.  Broady  were  hunting 
partners  and  have  been  together  on  many  deer 
hunts  through  the  Kankakee  Swamps.  In  1852 
Gideon  Alyea,  son  of  the  old  trap  maker,  built  a 
shanty  on  Butter  Nut  Ridge  and  trapped  this 
ground  for  many  years.  Leaving  the  Butter  Nut 
he   built   a   shanty  on  what   is  now  known   as 

42 


SETTING  STEEL  TRAPS 
Shanty   Island.       Me   also   built   a   shanty   on 
Fryes  Island  and  one  on  Cornell's  Upp<gr  Island. 
He  followed   the   business   until  old  age   com- 
pelled him  to  retire.     In   1847    William—Uncle 
Bill— Adams,  with  his  parents,  settled  near  He- 
bron and  five  years  later  he  went  in  the  swamps 
as  a  shanty  boy  with  /Ar.  Folsom,  handling  furs. 
Two  years  later  he  v/ent  into  the  trapping  busi- 
ness for  himself  and  in   "61"   he   answered   the 
cali  to  the  Colors  and  served  his   country  up  to 
the  close  of  the  war.      Returning  home  he  went 
into  the  swamps  again  hunting  and  trapping  un- 
til  some  time  in  the  90's,  when  he  retired.     In 
1850,  Isaac    Cornell   built   a  log  cabin  on  Cor- 
nell's  Island   for   rail  makers  who  were  making 
rails  for  him  and  a  few  years  later  an  old  Indian 
lived  in  it  and  hunted  game.       In  the  early  50's 
Hunter  f^ice  and  Harman  Granger  built  a  shanty 
on  a  small  ridge  lying   between    Red   Oak   and 
Bucks  Ridge,  known  as  Rice's   Ridge,   and   for 
many  years  it  was  used  as  a  trapper's  shanty. 
Aany  years  ago  there  were  some  deer   hunters 

43 


PIONEER  HUNTERS  OF  THE  KANKAKEE 
camped  on  this  ridge  and  tliere  was  an  old  ca- 
noe there  that  they  would  cross  the  river  in  to 
hunt,  as  there  were  more  deer  on  the  north  side 
than  on  the  south  side.  One  man  in  the  party 
became  dizzy-headed  and  sea-sick  so  easily 
that  they  had  to  lay  him  down  in  the  bottom  of 
the  canoe  and  sit  on  him  to  keep  him  from  fall- 
ing out. 

Bucks  Ridge  was  for  many   years   the  home 
of  the  Brockways.     They  were  a  very  interesting 
family,  consisting   of   a   father  and  mother,  two 
sons,  a  beautiful  daughter  and  a  little  boy   eight 
or  ten  years  old.      They  had  settled  there  many 
years  before  and  seemed  to  enjoy  their  wild  life, 
as  they  were  hunters  and  trappers.     From  them 
we   obtained   some   potatoes   and   corn  bread. 
The  youngest  of  the  hunting   party   fell   in   love 
with  this  young  damsel  and  we  thought   it   was 
going  to  be  a  match,  but  they  did    not   come   to 
time.       They   parted   with    many    bitter    tears, 
never  to  meet  again  as  the   mother  would   not 
part  with  her  darling  child. 

44 


SETTING  STEEL  TRAPS 
After  having  a  good  time  we  all  returned 
home,  proud,  with  plenty  of  game.  /Aany  v/ere 
the  hunts  I  took  after  that.  1  have  often  thought 
of  what  became  of  that  pretty,  fair-haired  girl  of 
the  Kankakee,  and  for  all  I  know  she  may  be 
with  the  angels  in  Heaven,  as  I  have  not  heard 
from  the  Brockways  since,  In  the  language  of 
/"Aaud  /Auller,  "Of  all  sad  words  of  tongue  or 
pen,  the  saddest  of  these,  it  might  have  been." 


45 


CHAPTER  V 
DIVIDING  THP:  game 

KILLING    DEER   WITH    PITCHFORKS 

AND   CORN    KNIVES   ON    BOGUS    ISLAND 

.  AND   HOW   WE   HUNTED   AND    DIVIDED 

GAME   IN    PIONEER   DAYS 

In  the  cold  winter  of  1838,  many  years  before 
Beaver  Lake  in  Newton  County,  Indiana,  was 
drained,  there  was  an  island  at  the  v/est  end  of 
the  lake  called  Sogus  Island  from  the  fact  that 
it  was  the  home  of  the  outlaws  and  despera- 
does. Bogus  Island,  as  this  island  has  been 
known  for  many  years,  was  the  last  refuge  of 
the  counterfeiters  of  the  picturesque  era  of  our 
Kankakee  life.  Mere,  until  comparatively  re- 
cent years,  the  robber,  the  counterfeiter,  the 
horse  thief,  the  highwayman  of  the  swamps  and 
the  "bad  man"  of  the  frontier  found  s^fe   retreat 

46 


DIVIDING   THE   GAME 

in  this  partly  wooded  island  and  in  the  rolling 
waters  of  this  beautiful  lake.  Even  the  Federal 
officers  in  pursuit  were  baffled  here,  for  years 
the  outlaws  lived  in  safety  on  wild  game  and  at 
times  would  raid  the  country-side  to  look  at  a 
pioneer's  horse.  With  the  draining  of  Beaver 
Lake,  Bogus  Island  entered  upon  its  final  des- 
tiny, The  island  at  one  place  was  only  about  a 
quarter  of  a  mile  from  the  mainland.  In  the  dry 
season  the  water  was  very  shallow  and  all  kinds 
of  game:  deer,  wolves  and  fox,  could  wade  or 
swim  to  the  island.  The  cold  winter  froze  the 
lake  over  and  the  ice  around  the  island  was 
slick  and  glaring,  with  the  island  full  of  deer, 
wolf  and  much  small  game.  Well  all  old  hunt- 
ers know  that  deer  or  any  other  cloven-footed 
animal,  when  chased,  cannot  stand  or  run  on 
glary  or  slick  ice.  Consequently  they  are  at  the 
mercy  of  anyone  who  comes  along.  Notice 
was  sent  out  far  and  wide  over  the  prairies  and 
sand  ridges  and  hunters'  cabin  along  the  Kan- 
kakee.    Allen  Dutcher,  f^aus  Allen,  Sam    liar- 

47 


PIONEER  HUNTERS  OF  THE  KANKAKEE 
rison,  Bill  Thayer,  Sam  /AcFadden  and  many 
other  pioneer  hunters  whose  names  I  have  for- 
gotten were  there.  5.  L.  AcFadden  was  there 
with  his  father  and  was  only  twelve  years  old. 
In  his  narrative  of  the  hunt,  as  he  related  it  to 
me,  he  said:  "1  will  never  forget  it  as  1  came 
near  freezing  to  death  going  home  from  the  hunt 
and  we  got  so  deer  that  we  could  not  take  care 
of  them  or  get  them  home  as  wc  had  no  means 
of  conveyance  in  those  days.  We  carried  some 
but  pulled  the  most  of  them  out  on  a  hand-sled. 
As  I  have  said  before,  the  island  was  alive  with 
deer.  The  hunters,  trappers  and  squattors 
gathered  in  with  guns.  The  oid  cap  and  ball 
rifle  were  used.  With  dogs,  clubs,  tomahawks, 
pitchforks  and  corn-knives  the  massacre  com- 
menced at  early  morning  and  at  sundown  the 
battle  closed.  The  crowd  consisted  of  about 
twenty-five  men  and  boys  and  two  women. 
One  of  the  women  killed  s  deer  with  a  pitch- 
fork. The  party  in  all  killed  sixty-five  deer, 
seven  wolves  and  two  or  three  foxes.       Wolves 

48 


DIVIDING   THE   GAME 

and  foxes  can  run  on  giary  ice  so  many  of  them 
got  away,  and  fully  as  many  deer  got  away  as 
were  killed,  by  slipping  and  sliding  towards  the 
shore.  There  were  so  many  that  they  could  not 
kill  them  all  at  once,  consequently  that  gave 
many  a  chance  to  escape.  Only  one  man  was 
hurt  in  the  fight  and  he  would  have  been  killed 
by  a  big  buck  had  he  not  been  rescued  in  time. 
The  buck  was  killed  with  a  corn  knife.  The 
wounded  hunter  was  placed  on  a  litter  and  car- 
ried to  his  cabin  on  the  Kankakee  at  what  was 
at  that  time  known  as  Harrison's  Landing. 
After  years  the  place  was  called  Thayers  and 
was  near  where  the  Grangers  years  after  had 
their  trapping  shanty  on  Grape  Island.  We 
used  to  camp  near  their  cabin  on  the  river  many 
years  after  the  big  hunt  on  Bogus  Island.  That 
deer  hunt  beat  the  world.  Now  I  am  going  to 
tell  you  hov/  v/e  used  to  hunt  and  divide  the 
game.  After  the  hunt  is  all  over  the  most  in- 
teresting of  all  is  the  dividing  of  the  gam.e  on  the 
square.     Sometimes   there   is   a    great    deal  of 

49 


PIONEER  HUNTERS  OF  THE  KANKAKEE 
sHull-dugery  in  the  matter  and  you  have  got  to 
keep  your  eyes  skinned  and  look  out  for  break- 
ers. Now  for  the  mode  of  dividing  the  spoil. 
Before  shot-guns  were  in  use  and  rifles  were  all 
the  go,  hunters'  law  was  that  the  men  who  drew 
first  blood  took  the  hide  and  half  the  meat,  but 
when  shot-guns  came  in  vogue  and  all  had  to 
drive  and  shoot  to  kill  the  deer  we  thought  that 
the  old  law  as  to  rifles  was  not  just.  5o  we 
held  a  Council  of  War  on  the  Kankakee  one 
time  and,  after  mature  deliberation,  v/e  changed 
it  and  decided  that  in  hunting  altogether  with 
shot-guns  and  rifles,  the  man  who  drew  first 
blood  was  entitled  to  the  hide  but  the  meat  and 
game  should  be  divided  equally  among  all. 
When  we  got  ready  to  divide,  the  game  is  divid- 
ed in  as  many  shares  as  there  are  hunters.  One 
turns  his  back  to  the  game  and  another  points 
at  each  pile  in  turn  and  also  asks  whose  it  is. 
And  the  one  with  his  back  turnea  says  who  is 
entitled  to  the  pile  or  bunch  pointed  at.  But 
sometim.es  a  heavy  accent  of  signal  by  the   one 

50 


DIVIDING   THE   GAME 

who  points  out  is  understood  by  the  man  whose 
back  is  turned.  They  sometimes  give  them- 
selves the  best  pile  of  game.  And  1  am  sorry 
to  say  that  I  have  sometimes  been  a  victim  of 
misplaced  confidence  in  that  way  and  cheated 
out  of  my  fair  share  of  the  game.  But  there 
v/as  no  use  to  squeal  about  it  as  they  would 
only  laugh  you  out  of  it  and  say  that  you  ought 
to  have  better  luck.  1  have  told  you  hov/  we 
hilled  deer  and  divided  game.  Now  one  great 
question  among  us  was  in  reference  to  still  or 
noisy  hunting.  The  Indians  alv/ays  still  hunt, 
that  is  they  keep  perfectly  quiet  and  motionless 
and  wait  for  the  game  to  come  along.  Or  they 
sneak  quietly  upon  the  game.  1  learned  this 
mode  of  hunting  with  the  Indians  on  the  West- 
ern plains,  hunting  buffalo  and  antelope  in  the 
open  country  many  years  ago.  You  can  hunt 
with  an  Indian  all  day  and  he  will  scarcely  say 
a  word.  With  over  fifty  years  experience  in 
hunting  both  in  the  forest  and  in  the  open  coun- 
try I  must  say  that  the  white  man  must  take  off 

51 


PIONEER  HUNTERS  OF  THE  KANKAKEE 
his  hat  to  the  Red  /Aan  when  it  comes  to  the 
scientific  mode  of  hunting  wild  game.  As  a 
matter  of  course  in  driving  in  thickets,  marshes 
and  ridges  we  had  to  make  all  the  noise  we 
could  to  get  the  deer  out.  But  this  was  the 
question.  In  coming  in  at  night  a  majoriry  of 
the  hunters  would  leave  loads  in  .their  guns,  in 
the  day  of  the  muzzle  loader,  all  night  and  get 
up  in  the  morning  before  daybreak  and  fire  them 
off,  wakening  the  whole  country  for  miles  around 
for  the  purpose  of  cleaning  their  guns  and  put- 
ting fresh  loads  in  so  they  would  not  miss  fire. 
Whilst  I  contended  that  doing  so  in  the  morning 
put  every  deer  within  hearing  of  the  camp  on 
the  alert  and  look  out  for  danger,  and  the  least 
noise  we  made  in  the  morning  was  the  best. 
But  a  majority  decided  against  me  but  1  never 
gave  up.  A  gun  well  taken  care  of  will  not  .miss 
fire  if  not  shot  off  for  a  week,  I  never  did  like  to 
hunt  with  a  noisy  camp  and  1  most  always  got 
the  most  game  by  keeping  still,  One  time  in 
moving  camp  two  of  the  party  decided  to  take  a 

52 


DIVIDING   THE   GAME 

near  cut  and  hunt  through  the  woods  and  join 
the  camp  at  night,  But  they  got  lost  and  we 
fired  signal  guns  and  built  a  big  fire.  Finally 
they  arrived  long  after  night,  tired. and  weary 
and  almost  exhausted.  Whilst  the  men  were 
lost  three  wild  geese  flew  over  them.  They  fired 
several  shots  and  succeeded  in  bringing  down 
one.  After  hunting  for  it  for  some  time  they 
found  it  had  fallen  in  an  old  deserted  well  of 
some  hunter  or  trapper,  perhaps  the  only  one 
around  for  miles.  They  brought  it  into  camp, 
that  is  the  goose  not  the  well,  and  we  moralized 
on  the  subject.  They  might  try  for  one  thous- 
and years  to  kill  a  wild  goose  and  have  it  fall 
into  that  well  again  and  not  succeed.  Now  was 
it  Providence  or  Chance  that  governed  in  this 
case?  While  1  want  to  be  a  Christian  and  be- 
lieve everything  that  is  good  and  true  I  could 
understand  special  Providence  that  (hear  talked 
so  much  about.  In  some  cases  a  man  a  half 
inch  too  far  away  is  killed  and  another  half  an 
inch  another  escapes.     And  by   the   least   little 

53 


PIONEER  HUNTERS  OF  THE  KANKAKEE 
thing  men  and  women  and  poor,  little,  innocent 
children,  through  no  fault  ot  theirs,  are  killed. 
And  others  by  the  most  trifling  thing  escape.  1 
have  seen  the  meanest  and  wickedest  person 
have  a  splendid  and  beautiful  day  for  their 
funeral  and  I  have  seen  the  friends  of  the  Lord 
poor  and  the  good  Christian  people  almost 
frozen  to  death  or  drowned  in  burying  their  dead. 
The  great  moral  question  with  me  is.  was  this 
earth  gotten  up  especially  for  the  benefit  of  Men, 
or  was  it  only  an  after-thought.  The  revolution 
of  the  sun.  moon  and  stars  are  perfect  to  a 
second.  But  when  v/c  come  down  to  the  lav/ 
governing  our  little  Earth  we  ail  imperfection, 
one  law  creating,  another  destroying.  It  is  noth- 
ing but  a  war  of  the  elements  and  a  law  of  des- 
truction between  every  living  thing.  There  is  no 
safety  or  security  in  any  place  or  thing.  It  is 
said  v/hat  a  beautiful  act  of  Providence  it  was 
that  lie  created  one  set  of  animals  and  birds  to 
keep  one  another  set  down  or  the  world  would 
be  over-run  with  them.       This  is  about  the  way 

54 


DIVIDING   THE   GAME 

with  some  of  the  human  family,  destroying  one 
another  with  war  and  miurder  while  Providence 
with  pestilence,  famine  and  accidents  keeps  the 
human  family  from  over-running  the  earth. 
I  have  noticed  when  a  vessel  goes  down  at  sea, 
loaded  down  with  precious  freight,  that  Provi- 
dence alv/ays  seems  to  be  on  the  side  of 
the  strongest  who  are  good  swimmers,  v/hiist 
the  poor  helpless  women  and  little  children  are 
lost.  if  Providence  had  anything  to  do  with  it 
He  would  have  kept  the  boat  from  going  down. 
Some  years  ago  on  a  western  railroad  a  pas- 
senger train  conveying  a  large  number  of  Di- 
vines to  a  Conference  or  Synod  ran  over  some 
cattle  on  a  high  grade  and  threw  the  cars  dov/n 
a  steep  enbankment.  Fortunately  no  one  was 
killed  and  the  Divines  came  out  with  a  card 
thanking  Providence  for  their  safety.  The  su- 
perintendent also  came  out  with  a  card  and  said 
that  if  Providence  had  anything  to  do  with  it  lie 
would  have  kept  the  cattle  off  the  track  in  the 
fiEst  place.     So   you  see   how  it  goes.     In   my 

55 


PIONEER  HUNTERS  OF  THE  KANfvAKEE 
hunting  experience  for  many  years  I  have  found 
more  special  cases  of  special  Providence  for  the 
animals  and  birds  than  I  ever  saw  for  the  human 
family.  Iwill  tell  you  of  a  stubbed  tailed  brindle 
dog  that  belonged  to  one  of  the  party.  Whilst 
out  hunting  he  ran  the  deer  out  of  a  thicket  to 
me  and  1  did  not  shoot  for  laughing  at  one  of 
the  boys  who  was  so  excited  that  he  could  not 
shoot  because  the  deer  ran  v/ithin  a  few  yards  of 
him..  Just  at  that  time  the  thought  came  to  him 
that  he  had  left  camp  without  any  bullets.  His 
father  was  some  distance  away  v/hen  he  called 
aloud:  "Daddy,  have  you  got  the  bullets?"  This 
frightened  the  deer  and  he  turned  toward  me. 
The  dog  came  up,  looked  me  in  the  face  as 
much  to  say,  "Aint  you  ashamed  of  yourself  for 
letting  that  deer  get  away?"  And  he  turned  and 
left  me  as  other  friends  had  left  me  before,  and 
would  not  drive  any  more  deer  to  me  until  I  had 
redeemed  myself.  1  will  tell  you  how  that  was 
done.  Another  time  we  were  out  hunting  and 
as  I  was  on  the  left  flank  half   a   mile    from  the 

56 


DIVIDING   THE   GAME 

rest  of  the  party  I  heard  a  noise  and  looking 
around  I  saw  a  large  buck  coming  straight  to- 
v/ard  me  and  the  dog  right  after  him,  fie  came 
up  to  within  fifty  yards  of  me  and  then  turned 
off  to  the  left.  I  got  up  out  of  the  grass,  gave 
him  both  barrels  and  sav/  every  shot  strike  him 
in  the  side.  He  ran  about  seventy  yards  and 
tumbled.  The  dog  came  up  and  saw  what  1 
had  done  and  looked  me  in  the  face  and  wagged 
his  srub-tail  as  much  as  to  say,  "You  are  a 
bully  boy  with  a  glass  eye  and  have  done  the 
right  thing  this  time  and  I  will  stand  by  you." 
And  he  did.  He  stayed  with  me  all  that  day. 
Some  say  that  animals  have  instinct  only  and 
not  sense.  Talk  about  instinct,  Here  is  a  gen- 
uine, clear,  solid  sense  and  no  fooling  about  it. 
I  believe  that  some  animals  have  sense  and 
reasoning  faculties  as  well  as  the  human  family 
and  far  excel  them  in  some  things,  protecting 
their  young  and  obtaining  food  and  shelter  for 
them.  I  will  nov/  relate  the  nearest  special 
providence  and  sense  in  any  animal  that  I  ever 

57 


PIONEER  HUNTERS  OF  THE  KANKAKEE 
saw.  This  is  tlie  young  fawn  or  deer.  When 
it  comes  forth  it  is  the  most  helpless  thing  in  the 
world  and  the  least  animal  in  the  world  could 
kill  it.  And  now  comes  the  most  wonderful 
part  of  all  and  is  true  as  holy  v/rit.  From  the 
time  the  fav/n  is  born  until  it  is  able  to  run  it  has 
no  scent  or  smell.  All  kinds  of  ferocious  ani- 
mals, wolves,  wild-cats,  dogs,  will  pass  it  within 
a  few  feet  and  will  not  detect  it  unless  they  see 
it.  The  fawn  lies  in  the  most  secluded  and  out 
of  the  way  places  imaginable,  and  will  lie  per- 
fectly still  all  day  without  moving,  in  the  same 
place  where  its  mother  left  in  the  morning.  The 
doe  stays  near  and  watches  it  all  night  but 
leaves  it  early  in  the  morning  and  stays  away 
all  day,  only  returning  at  nightfall  to  suckle  and 
nourish  it,  knowing  full  well  that  if  found  near  it 
in  day  time  her  presence  might  lead  to  its  dis- 
covery. But  what  a  wonderful  provision  is 
providence,  sense  or  instinct  that  keeps  that 
little  helpless  animal  still,  away  from  its  mother 
all  day.     You   may   pass   within   a   few  feet  of 

58 


DIVIDING   THE  GAME 

them  and  they  will  not  move.  Father  told  me 
that  while  hunting  on  the  North  /Aarsh  he 
stepped  over  two  of  them  in  the  grass  before 
they  ran,  whilst  he  was  looking  for  a  squirrel  fox. 
If  you  find  one  when  very  youjig  you  can  pick  it 
up  and  carry  it  a  short  distance  and  then  let  it 
down  and  it  will  follow  you  home  like  a  dog  and 
become  very  tame.  Another  time  v/e  were 
hunting  and  the  dog  ran  a  deer  out  of  the  thicket 
and  we  all  fired  and  wounded  it,  m.aking  enough 
noise  to  drive  all  the  deer  out  of  the  country. 
V/e  followed  the  wounded  deer  a  short  distance 
and  got  it,  After  hunting  around  for  awhile  we 
started  for  camp.  In  the  evening  our  route  to 
camp  took  us  by  the  same  thicket  from  which 
we  started  the  deer  in  the  morning.  We  were 
scattered  out,  tired  and  weary,  taking  our  time 
to  it.  One  of  the  party  was  some  distance  be- 
hind and  near  the  thicket  in  the  marsh.  On 
turning  around  I  saw  him  aiming  at  something 
ten  or  fifteen  feet  from  him  in  the  grass.  Me 
fired  and  killed  what  he   supposed  was  a  rabbit, 

59 


PIONEER  HUNTERS  OF  THE  KANKAKEE 
but  he  came  to  find  out  that  itv/as  a  young  deer 
that  had  hidden  there  all  day  in  the  grass  near 
the  thicket  where  we  had  fired  three  or  shots  in 
the  morning.  All  this  noise  and  firing  had  not 
disturbed  it  or  m.ade  it  move,  and  this  is  more 
than  a  young  of  the  hun^an  family  could  have 
done  without  squalling  and  making  a  fuss.  So 
it  is  with  the  birds.  The  sam.e  special  Provi- 
dence that  guides  and  protects  the  animals  does 
likewise  to  the  feathery  tribes.  Ramibling 
through  the  woods  and  over  the  marshes  one 
often  finds  a  covey  of  quail  or  a  brood  of 
pheasants.  To  see  how  the  m.other  bird  pro- 
tects her  young;  she  will  flop  and  flutter  to  at- 
tract your  attention  from  the  young  birds  so  that 
you  would  think  she  had  both  wfngs  broken, 
fluttering  just  far  enough  to  keep  out  of  your 
reach,  long  enough  for  the  young  birds  to  skulk 
away  and  hide  in  the  grass.  Take  a  stroll 
through  the  woods  in  the  Springtime  and  you 
will  smile  at  the  swinging  birds  with  your  wise, 
amused  pity,  who  builds  her  tiny  nest  v/ith  such 

60 


DIVIDING   THE   GAME 

laborious  care,  high  up  out  on  the  moving  tree 
top,  only  to  be  blown  av/ay  by  the  chilly  autumn 
winds.  But  are  not  the  homes  of  the  human 
family,  the  sweetest  homes  of  our  tenderest  love 
built  upon  just  as  insecure  a  foundation,  hang- 
ing over  some  mysterious  depths,  and  rocked  to 
and  fro  only  to  be  swept  away  into  ruin.  And 
yet  He  who  has  provided  a  balmy  South  as  a 
refuge  for  the  summer  birds  to  which  they  can 
fly,  has  He  not  provided  likewise  a  shelter  for 
the  human  family?  I  might  write  a  book  on 
"Special  Providence  for  Animals  and  Birds"  but 
I  will  leave  that  for  the  naturalist, 


61 


CHAPTER  VI 
MY  FIRST  BOAT  RIDE 

MY  FIRST  FISHING 

TRIP  TO  THE  KANKAKEE 

AND    MY  FIRST  BOAT  RIDE  AND 

EARLY  EXPERIENCES  WITH 

A   SHOT  GUN 

To  shorten  up  a  story  that  is  already  too  long 
is  somewhat  of  a  task.  When  I  found  that  I 
have  considerable  more  material  than  1  can  in- 
sert in  this  little  book  and  unless  1  cut  out  some 
of  the  details  there  is  dangers  of  slopping  over- 
Therefore,  1  will  have  to  hold  myself  down  to 
the  mere  facts.  Since  the  newspapers  and 
magazines  have  been  offering  prizes  for  the  best 
fish  stories  some  of  the  anglers  have  caught 
bigger  fish  stories  than  they  did  fish.  Just  see 
what  this  angling  game  is  coming  to  when  a  man 
has  to  make  an  affidavit  and  give  advance    no- 


>2 


MY  FII^ST  BOAT  RIDE 
[ice  he  is  telling  icie  truth  before  he  dare  open 
his  mouth  about  fishing,  Just  because  my 
pencil  happened  to  slip  once  when  I  was  de- 
scribing a  fishing  trip  on  the  Cottenwood  River 
in  Northern  /Minnesota  many  years  ago  is  no 
sign  1  cannot  tell  the  nude,  naked  truth  if  I  try 
hard  enough,  i  am  and  always  have  been  a 
"dyed"  in  the  v/ool  crank  on  fishing  ever  since 
boyhood.  1  began  my  first  fishing  in  a  small 
creek  that  ran  near  our  cabin.  Ay  first  fishing 
outfit  consisted  of  a  red  v/illow  pole,  a  shoestring 
line  and  a  bent  pin  for  a  hook.  Grasshoppers, 
grub  v/orms  and  angle  v/orms  v/ere  the  bait. 
Chubs  and  sun-fish  were  the  kind  of  fish  I 
caught,  if  any.  Sometimes  I  would  go  fishing 
at  night  for  cat-fish,  and  do  very  well  until  that 
big  swamp  owl  would  hoot  "Who  are  you,"  and 
that  would  end  my  fishing  for  that  night.  The 
summer  that  1  was  eight  years  old  Father  took 
me  wrth  himi  to  the  Kankakee.  We  were  fish- 
ing from  the  bank  at  North  Bend,  which  I  have 
mentioned  before     Whilst  we  were    fishing    F\r. 

63 


PIONEER  HUNTERS  OF  THE  KANKIAKEE 
Samuel  Irvin,  a  trapper,  came  floating  down  the 
river  in  a  skiii.  This  v/as  the  first  water  craft  I 
had  ever  seen.  r\r.  Irvin  landed  his  boat  and 
he  and  father,  being  old  friends,  sat  on  the  bank 
in  the  shade  talking  whilst  I  was  fishing  part  of 
the  time  and  climbing  swamp  trees  until  I  got 
tired.  Finally  I  made  knov/n  my  desire  to  ride 
in  one  of  those  things— the  boat.  Father  told 
me  to  get  in  and  sit  down  in  the  bottom  of  the 
boat.  I  did  and  then  he  got  into  the  boat  and 
shoved  it  out  into  the  stream.  We  went  down 
around  the  bend  and  back  to  where  we  started, 
1  have  often  thought  of  sitting  in  the  bottom  of 
the  boat  and  grasping  the  sides  so  tight  that  I 
dented  the  sides  of  the  boat  with  my  fingers  to 
keep  from  falling  out  v/hen  there  was  no  danger 
of  falling  out  unless  the  boat  upset.  This  was 
my  first  fishi.ng  trip  to  the  Kankakee  River  and 
my  first  boat  ride.  Near  this  same  place  fifty 
years  later  leather  ran  me  on  my  last  duck  hunt- 
ing trip  on  the  Kankakee.  He  v/as  then  over 
four-score  years  of  age,  yet  he  could   handle   a 

64 


MY  FIRST  BOAT  RIDE 
hunting  boat  then  as  well  as  he  did  when  he 
gave  me  my  first  boat  ride.  Among  the  earliest 
recollections  of  my  boyhood  hunting  with  a  gun 
are  a  fev/  of  my  first  shots,  in  1869  Father 
bought  a  nev/  hzavy  number  ten  double-barrel 
muzzle-loading  shot  gun.  Breach-loaders  were 
not  so  numerous  then  as  now.  it  was  so  heavy 
that  I  could  not  hold  it  to  load  or  shoot.  Yet  I 
was  anxious  to  shoot  it  once.  One  day  1  v/as 
out  in  the  woods  near  the  house  gsthering  hick- 
ory nuts  and  the  dog  treed  a  black  squirrel, 
father  was  home  and  I  got  him  to  let  me  shoot 
it.  lie  put  in  a  light  load  as  the  squirrel  was  on 
a  small  tree  and  not  very  high  up.  Then  put- 
ting his  thumb  around  a  small  bush  and  letting 
his  fingers  open,  lying  the  gun  on  his  fingers 
against  the  bush,  which  made  a  good  rest,  he 
soon  initiated  me  in  the  mysteries  of  handling  a 
gun.  He  told  me  to  look  along  the  barrel  until 
1  saw  the  squirrel,  then  to  pull  the  trigger.  This 
I  did.  Bang!  The  recoil  knocked  me  down. 
V/hcn  I  got  up  my  nose  was  bleeding  quite  free- 

65 


PIONEER  HUNTERS  OF  THE  KANKAKEE 
ly,  but  I  went  and  picked  up  my  squirrel.  Father 
said  {  was  initiated.  1  am  sure  it  was  a  labor  o 
love  on  his  part  and  1  made  repeated  progress 
under  his  tutorin-g.  That  same  Fall  1  began  my 
practicing  on  v/ing  shots,  Near  our  house  and 
between  the  main  land  and  swamp  timber  was 
a  strip  of  open  marsh.  This  was  a  great  fly- 
way  for  ducks,  from  the  north  bend  of  the  river 
across  to  Sandy  Hook.  One  afternoon  1  took 
the  gun  out  on  this  fly-way,  hid  behind  some 
pucker  bush,  shot  and  killed  the  first  duck  that 
came  along  which  happened  to  be  a  Grey  Aal- 
lard  or  Greenhead.  1  waded  out  in  the  marsh. 
The  water  was  about  two  feet  deep  and  cold,  as 
it  was  late  in  November.  It  was  the  proudest 
moment  in  my  life.  1  took  the  duck  to  the 
house,  Father  being  away  from  home.  /Aother 
wanted  to  have  it  for  supper  but  I  would  not 
have  it  that  way.  I  wanted  Father  to  see  it, 
feathers  and  all.  As  I  have  said,  it  was  the 
proudest  moment  of  my  life  when  I  showed  the 
bird   to   my  Father,     It  was  my  first  game  bird. 

66 


MY  FIRST  BOAT  RIDE 
A\y  boyish  heart  swelled  with  pride.  /Ay  great- 
est desire  had  been  gratified.  1  found  I  had  ac- 
quired the  "knack"  and  from  that  time  on  I  be- 
came a  "wing  shot."  I  was  the  only  boy  in  the 
neighborhood  that  could  shoot  "flying."  I  was 
greatly  envied  by  my  boy  chums.  /Aany  of 
them  were  much  older  than  I,  so  much  so  that 
one  day  I  overheard  one  of  our  neighbors  say  to 
his  v/ife,  "Werich  will  ruin  that  boy  by  letting  him 
run  around  totting  a  gun  all  the  time.  They'd  a 
darn  sight  better  keep  him  at  work  doing  some- 
thing worth  while."  A  few  years  later  v/hen 
breech  loaders  became  more  plentiful  Father 
bought  one  and  gave  me  the  old  muzzle  loader, 
or  rather  I  traded  him  an  old  watch  for  it.  The 
gun  and  I  became  inseperable  and  I  would  keep 
it  in  the  parlor  if  my  wife  v/ould  have  permitted 
it.  I  thought  so  much  of  that  old  gun  that  in 
1884  1  carried  it  across  the  Western  Plains  to 
the  foothills  of  the  Rockies  for  the  purpose  of 
shooting  wild  game,  as  it  was  the  best  gun  to 
throv/  coarse  shot  that  I  ever  saw.      For  double 

67 


PIONEER  HUNTERS  OF  THE  KANKAKEE 
BB  and  swan  shot  it  could  not  be  beat  and  for 
buck  shot  it  v/as  a  daisy.  It  would  chamber 
three  number  one  buck  shot  and  nine  made  a 
load.  Firing  two  shots  into  a  bunch  of  ante- 
lope at  eighty  or  a  hundred  yards  certainly  made 
the  hair  fly.  Returning  home  the  following  year 
"85"  I  cleaned  up  the  old  gun  and  have  not 
loaded  it  since.  That  has  been  more  than  a 
third  of  a  century  ago.  Father  had  promised  to 
take  me  duck  hunting  v/ith  him  in  the  swamps 
just  as  soon  as  I  could  shoot  "flying."  Aany  a 
hunting  trip  on  the  Kankakee  River  he  has 
shoved  me  and  I  have  v/itnessed  many  remark- 
able shots  as  well  as  many  poor  ones.  Father 
is  a  man  who  made  but  little  show  of  his  emo- 
tions but  1  could  see  a  change  in  his  eye  when- 
ever I  made  a  good  shot,  and  I  knew  he  was  as 
well  pleased  as  I  was.  I  heard  Bill  Adams 
whisper  to  Jerome  Rathborn  one  time  when 
they  were  stopping  at  our  place  on  a  duck  hunt: 
"That  boy  of  John's  can  shoot  like  the  very  de- 
vil and  if  he  keeps  on  improving  by  the  time  he 

68 


MY  FIRST  BOAT  RIDE 
is   [ifleen   he  will  be  the  champion  shot   on  the 
Kankakee."     On  my  last   hunting   trip   on   the 
Kankakee,  Father  was  with  me,  as  mention  has 
been  made,  and  was  running  the  boat,   when    I 
made  two  of  the   most  remarkable   wing   shots 
ever  made  in  all  my   hunting   experience.     We 
were   going   through    the    mouth   of  old  Sandy 
Hook  when  a  pair  oi  blue  v/ing  teels  came   fly- 
ing past  about  tv/o  feet  above  the  water.     As  all 
old-time  duck  hunters  know,  a  teel  is  the  hard- 
est bird  to  hit  of  the  duck  family  on   account   of 
darting   and   zlgzaging  in   their   flight.     I  pulled 
down  on  them  with  the  right  barrel    of   the   gun 
as  they  were  a  long  way  off  and  to  my  surprise 
they  both  fell  dead.     The   same   morning   over 
in   Cornell's    Bayou    I  made  another  wonderful 
double  shot.    We  v/ere  coasting  down  the  bayou 
and  Father  v/as  manipulating  the  paddle   and  I 
the  hardware  when  a  pair  of   mallards   rose   up 
out  of  the  timber  to  my  right.      The  brush   was 
so  thick  that  I  could  not  get   sight   of   either   of 
them  until  they  flew  out  into  the   opening.     By 

69 


PIONEER  HUNTERS  OF  THE  KANKAKEE 
this  time  they  were  a  long  way  off,  too  far  to 
shoot  at  using  good  judgment,  But  I  decided  to 
try  them.  Giving  the  gun  considerable  eleva- 
tion 1  pulled  the  trigger  and  greatly  to  my  aston- 
ishment both  fell,  one  dead,  the  other  winged^ 
and  before  I  could  give  the  crippled  one  the 
other  barrel  it  skulked  off  in  the  pucker  brush 
and  I  lost  it.  As  I  have  said  before,  my  Father 
was  at  this  time  over  four-score  years,  and  at 
this  writing,  1920.  is  in  his  nintieth  year.  lie 
continued  his  hunting  until  the  infirmities  of  age 
removed  him  from  the  swamps.  This  day  fin- 
ished our  shooting.  I  returned  to  my  home  in 
Logansport,  Indiana,  and  before  the  duck  hunt- 
ing season  opened  again  I  lost  my  right  arm  at 
the  shoulder  in  a  railroad  accident.  This  was 
my  last  hunt  on  the  Kankakee  and  for  this  rea- 
son I  mention  this  incident.  The  reader  will  re- 
member in  the  opening  chapter  that  I  set  steel 
traps  and  caught  wild  game  long  before  I  was 
large  enough  or  old  enough  to  carry  a  gun.  hav- 
ing in   all   spent   over  a  half  century  in  hunting 

70 


JOHN  WERICH— Born  in  1830.  The  oldest  pioneer 
hunter  hving,  now  in  his  90th  year.  Regan  hunting  on  the 
Kankakee  in  1852.  A  few  months  before  this  book  went  to 
press  he  shot  and  killed  a  tiger  cat  that  measured  forty  inches 
long  and  stood  seventeen  inches  high,  the  first  one  ever  seen 
in    the    Kankakee    swamps,    supposed  to  have  escaped  from 


some  menagerie. 


c   c    c 


<  c  «  o 


c       o »    »      *   o     • 


»    C     C  9  «    C' 


MY  FIRST  BOAT  RIDE 
and  trapping  on  the  Kankakee. 


CHAPTER  VII 
HUNTERS  WHO  HAVE  BUCKFEVERED 

GUNS 

THAT  HAVE  SPASMS 

AND   HUNTERS   THAT   HAVE 

THE   BUCK   FEVER 

One  more  story  and  it  will  conclude  the  series 
of  incidents  in  deer  hunting.  But  all  of  this  is  a 
matter  of  history  to  the  man  who  has  tramped 
the  woods  for  years.  It  is  only  repeating  old 
stories  to  tell  of  the  deer  that  ran  too  fast  for  you 
to  shoot.  I  once  saw  a  tenderfoot  hunter  jump 
up  a  deer  at  close  range  and  he  stood  and 
watched  the  deer  until  it  was  out  of  sight  before 
he  realized  he  had  a  gun  in  his  hands.  And  so 
it  is  with  others;  the  duck  that  always  flew  be- 
hind the  hunter  as  he  sat  on  a  musk  rat  house 
in  a  slough  and  could  not  turn  around,  or  of  the 

72 


c 

3 


0) 


-a 

6J! 


-a 

a 


C 

o 

r- 

O 
C 

o 

0) 

o 


HUNTERS  WHO  HAVE  BUCKFEVERED 
flock  of  wild  geese  that  had  lit  in  the  pond  in  the 
cow  pasture  that  day  he  had  no  gun,  If  you 
had  pressed  your  nose  against  the  pane  and 
peeped  through  the  window  of  a  little  log  hunt- 
i'ng  camp  on  an  island  near  Sandy  Hook,  say 
about  eight  p.  m.,  on  a  November  evening  forty- 
two  years  ago,  you  v/ou!d  have  candle-lighted 
three  young  men  sitting  around  an  old  cook 
stove.  Two  of  the  men  were  pulling  on  old  clay 
pipes,  and  each  was  at  peace  v/ith  the  world  as 
far  as  I  know.  Let  me  introduce  you  to  them. 
In  the  opposite  picture  that  guy  standing  by  the 
stove  but  usually  sitting  down  in  the  easiest 
chair  (an  old  cracker  box)  to  be  found  in  camp, 
and  absorbing  the  most  heat,  is  my  friend  Bill 
Garrison,  whom  1  brought  along  on  his  first  deer 
hunting  expedition  in  the  Kankakee  swamps. 
Leave  it  to  "Bill."  He  always  grabs  the  big- 
gest potato  in  the  dish  and  the  huskiest  wedge 
of  pie  on  the  plate,  and  always  gets  the  softest 
seat  in  camp.  The  tall,  lanky,  leather-faced 
gink   sitting  on  the  woodpile  behind  the   stove, 

73 


THE  PIONEER  HUNTERS  OF  THE  KANKAKEE 
dressing  a  musk-rat  hide  is  Jolly  Smiih,  an  ail- 
around  camper  and  fur-dresser  and  flap- 
flap  flipper,  head  cook  and  dish  v/asher,  trapper, 
fur-trader,  and  a  good  trailer.  I  should  say  off 
hand  that  Jolly  stands  about  seventy-three 
inches  in  his  socks,  and  when  he  stretches  his 
neck  to  rubber  after  game  he  is  taller'n  that. 
Thzre  isn't  an  ounce  of  supsrflous  flesh  on  hiiri. 
In  fact,  there  isn't  much  flesh  of  any  kind.  Jolly 
is  so  thin  he  would  have  to  stand  a  long  time  in 
bright  sun  to  make  a  decent  shadow.  You  can 
see  his  back  from  the  front  if  you  stare  hard 
enough  and  I  reckon  an  expectorate  who  would 
put  a  little  velocity  int-o  his  work  could  spit  a 
hole  through  Jolly  three  times  out  of  five.  But 
anybody  who  picks  up  Smith  for  a  v/eak-kneed 
hunter  on  a  long  run  makes  a  mistake.  On  the 
trail  he  is  tougher  than  a  boiled  owl.  The  other 
guy  sitting  in  front  of  the  stove  with  a  bar  of 
lead,  laddie  and  bullet  molds,  running  bullets 
that  hunter  is— well,  I'm  too  modest  to  say  who 
it  is.     All  1  will  say  is  that  there  were  three  of  us 

74 


HUNTERS  WHO  HAVE  BUCKFEVERED 
in  the  party.  1  have  already  described  two.  so 
you  can  draw  your  own  conclusions  as  to  the 
identity  of  the  third,  The  next  morning  it  was 
clear  and  cold,  the  shallow  water  around  the 
edges  of  the  swamps  was  frozen  over.  We  had 
decided  to  drive  the  ridges  so  one  of  our  party 
was  to  take  the  dog  and  go  up  the  river  on  the 
south  side  to  the  flats.  Perhaps  I  ought  to  ex- 
plain a  little  what  is  meant  by  the  flats.  /Aany 
French  and  Spanish  words  have  become  incor- 
porated with  the  English  in  America  that  one 
hardly  knows  the  name  of  things  and  places  by 
their  right  names.  The  flats  is  a  high,  dry 
swamp,  that  part  of  the  swamp  that  is  seldom 
under  water  except  in  extremely  high-water 
times.  These  flats  are  covered  with  heavy  tim- 
ber of  swamp-oak.  In  the  Fall  and  early  winter 
they  are  a  great  place  for  deer  to  feed  by  noz- 
zling  in  the  leaves  and  snow  for  acorns.  And 
that  was  the  head  of  the  ridges  and  almost  a 
sure  place  for  the  dog  to  take  up  a  trail.  On 
account  of  freezing  up,  the  deer   would  run   the 

75 


PIONEER  HUNTERS  OF  THE  KANKAKEE 
flats  and  ridges  and  they  would  have  to  be 
chased  hard  before  they  would  run  the  low 
swamps.  Big  Beech  Ridge  was  to  be  my  stand 
and  Garrison  on  the  west  end  of  Peach  Island. 
Smith  took  the  dog  to  the  flats  and  had  no  more 
than  got  on  them  when  the  dog  took  up  a  trail. 
Just  after  sunrise  I  reached  the  east  end  of  the 
ridge  only  to  see  two  hunters  coming  up  from 
the  other  side.  We  were  strangers,  1  had  never 
met  either  of  them  before,  but  I  never  stand  on 
cerem©ny  with  a  sportsman.  An  acquaintance 
was  soon  struck  up  between  us.  They  were 
from  South  Bend.  Indiana,  and  had  a  camp  on 
Goose  Island.  One  of  the  hunters  was  a  grey- 
haired  man,  probably  sixty-five  years  of  age, 
and  claimed  to  be  an  old  deer  hunter  who  had 
hunted  and  killed  deer  with  the  Indians  when 
the  Kankakee  Swamps  ^ti<zxQ  yet  the  hunting 
grounds  of  the  Pottowattomies,  Mis  partner 
was  much  younger.  The  old  hunter  was  one  of 
those  fellows  that  thought  he  knew  it  all  and 
what  he  did  not  know  about  deer   hunting   was 

76 


HUNTERS  WHO  HAVE  BUCKFEVERED 
not  worth  knowing.  The  young  hunter  looked 
with  great  admiration  upon  his  older  companion 
end  would  do  anything  that  he  directed.  They 
had  sent  their  dogs  up  the  swamps.  They  said 
that  all  but  one  were  young  dogs  and  that  the 
old  dog  did  not  amount  to  much.  Our  dog  was 
a  good  one,  the  best  I  ever  hunted  with,  a  good 
tounger  and  swift  on  the  trail.  They  were  all 
the  time  bragging  and  boasting  on  their  dog 
"Spot"  for  being  a  good  runner.  I  tried  to  get 
them  to  agree  with  me  on  what  would  be  the  re- 
sult if  their  dog  should  bring  a  deer  to  this  point 
and  I  should  kill  it,  or  if  my  dog  should  chase 
one  or  more  to  them  and  if  they  should  kill  it. 
But  they  did  not  want  to  discuss  the  subject  so 
it  was  dropped.  A  fire  was  built  in  the  end  of 
an  old  butternut  iog  and  we  stood  around  it  and 
listened  for  the  dogs.  We  were  on  the  east  end 
of  the  ridge  and  in  a  hoUow.  On  each  side  of 
the  hollow  the  bluff  is  very  steep.  The  hollow 
was  about  seventy-five  or  eighty  yards  wide.  If 
a  deer  was  headed  for  this  ridg2  from  the  east  it 

77 


PIONEER  HUNTERS  OF  THE  I^ANKAKEE 
would  run  this  hollow  to  get  on   the  ridge.     Ay 
number  ten  muzzle-loader,    loaded   with  buck- 
shot,  rested   sgainst   a   tree.     The  old  hunter's 
gun  was  a  double  combination  of  shot  rifle  gun, 
ten   guage   shot  and  30-30  rifle.     The   young 
hunter   was   using   a    cap  and  ball  rifle.     Their 
guns  were  leaning   against   the   log.     We  were 
sitting  around  the  fire,  as  it  was  a  cold  morning, 
listening  for  the  dogs  when  suddenly  from  away 
off  up  the   ridges   came   the  silvery  voice  of  a 
hound.     But  only   for   a  moment  was  he  heard 
as  he  crossed  from  one  ridge  to  another   on  the 
way  to  Peach  Island.     A  moment  and  again  the 
bugle   notes   rang   out   and   warned  us  that  the 
deer   was  running   the  north  ridges  and    would 
come   to   this  point   where   we  were  stationed. 
The   music   told   us   that  the  dog  had   reached 
Peach    fridge   about  a  mile  away.     V/hose  dog 
was  making  the   noise   was   the   question   that 
none  of  us  could  tell,  but  each  imagined  that  he 
could  diatinguish  the  voice  of   his   favorite   dog. 
One  thing  1  was  sure  of  and  that  was  that  there 

78 


HUNTERS  WHO  HAVE  BUCKFEVERED 
was  but  one  dog  in  the  chase.  About  half  a 
mile  up  the  swamp  we  heard  the  crack  of  a 
rifle  four  times  in  succession.  We  gave  up  right 
then  and  there  that  somebody  had  got  our 
deer  and  that  we  weren't  in  it.  I  sat  down  on 
the  log  again  by  the  fire.  The  dog  was  running 
yet  and  I  told  /Ar.  Spencer,  as  that  was  his 
name,  that  there  was  some  hope  for  us  yet  as 
the  dogs  were  still  running.  For  the  tounging 
of  the  hound  was  coming  closer  all  the  time. 
Just  then  we  heard  two  reports  of  a  shot  gun  in 
rapid  firing  and  I  knew  it  was  Garrison  for  I  can 
tell  when  he  is  shooting  because  he  always 
shoots  his  "second"  barrel  first,  referring  to  his 
quickness  with  his  second  shot.  Following  this 
we  heard  the  crack  of  a  rifle  and  again  four 
shots  had  been  fired  and  yet  the  hound  was 
coming  on  towards  us.  Two  or  three  times 
since  the  dog  had  reached  Peach  Ridge  had  I 
urged  my  companions  to  sit  down  or  conceal 
themselves  so  that  the  deer  would  not  be 
turned.     S'ut   /Ar.    K.now-it-alI  and  don't-want- 

79 


PIONEER  HUNTERS  OF  THE  KANKAICEE 
to-takc-advise-from-a-country-greenhorn  refus- 
ed. 1  told  him  that  advice  from  a  country 
greenhorn  was  about  as  good  as  that  of  a  city 
tenderfoot  and  that  their  actions  do  not  show 
very  much  skill  as  a  deer  hunter,  i  spoke  to 
them  again,  "Boys,  that  deer  is  coming  straight 
to  this  hollow  and  will  be  here  in  less  than  thre€ 
minutes.  Let  us  act  like  hunters  and  get  be- 
hind the  log."'  Just  then  1  saw  the  deer  coming 
from  the  other  side  of  the  ridge  straight  to  this 
stand,  a  big  buck,  and  it  was  right  upon  us  with- 
in twenty-five  yards  and  running  like  a  racer, 
sailing  over  old  logs  and  brush  with  the  ease  of 
a  bird.  At  this  I  fired  one  barrel  and  at  another 
leap  the  deer  was  behind  an  old  tree  so  I  could 
not  give  him  the  other  barrel.  The  young  hunt- 
er grabbed  up  his  gun  and  fired.  The  deer  at 
this  time  was  less  than  a  hundred  feet  from  him. 
lie  missed  fire  and  the  deer  ran  around  to  the 
other  side  of  the  ridge  and  while  doing  this  the 
man  with  the  rifle-shot  gun  fired  two  shots  and 
of  course  missed.     By  this  time  1  gave  him   my 

80 


HUNTERS  WHO  HAVE  BUCKFEVERED 
second  barrel  as  he  disappeared  into  a  black- 
berry  thicket  seventy-five  yards  away.  We 
all  looked  dumfounded  while  we  reloaded 
our  guns  and  finally  something  was  said  about 
old  "Spot,"  But  the  first  dog  that  came  up  was 
my  old  dog  Trump,"  His  eyes  were  ablaze 
with  excitement  and  1  called  out  "here  Trump" 
and  with  a  look  of  surprise  the  grand  old  dog 
recognized  me.  Wagging  his  tail  he  came  up  to 
me  to  be  approved.  /Meanwhile  /Ar.  Spencer 
had  gone  to  where  the  deer  had  turned  past  us 
and  found  great  splotches  of  blood  on  the  leaves. 
The  dog  took  up  the  trail  and  in  a  short  time 
brought  the  buck  back  by  me  at  the  rate  of  a 
mile  a  minute.  1  v^as  on  the  top  of  the  slope 
while  the  deer  ran  the  edge  of  the  ridge  below 
me.  A\y  fusee  banged  out  twice.  1  held  right 
on  that  big  buck  at  about  one  hundred  and  fifty 
feet  away  and  the  buck  kept  right  on  going. 
Whang-bang  went  the  rifle-shot-gun  of  the  hunt- 
er who  knows  just  how  to  do  it.  The  deer  was 
not  more  than  a  hundred  feet  from  him  and  not 

81 


PIONEER  HUNTERS  OF  THE  KANKAKEE 
a  ball  or  a  shot  touched  him.     The  dog  was  giv- 
ing him  a  very  close  chase  and  when  his  loung- 
ing suddenly  ceased  1  knew  what   had  happen- 
ed.    A   moment   later   I    had  my  hunting  knife 
into   the   buck's   neck   long  before  the  firstclass 
deer  hunter  came  up.     Then  the  question   was, 
who   shot  the   deer.     On   examining  it.  it   was 
found  that  he  had  been  hit  in   the   shoulder  by 
one  buck  shot,  from  my  first   shot,   on   the  first 
round  as  he  was  running  right  side  to  me.     He 
ran  until  he  tumbled  over.     The  three  of  us  had 
fired  nine  shots  and  I  learned  afterwards   it  was 
the   same   deer   that   had  passed  three  hunters 
and  that  there  had  been  ten  shots  fired  at  it  be- 
fore it  reached  us.  making  in  all  nineteen  shots 
in  less  than  ten  minutesand  only  one  bullet  had 
pierced  his  hide.     Bad  shooting  secured   for   us 
lots  of  excitement  and  run,      A    reminiscence   I 
shall  always  remember.     There  are  a   class  of 
hunters  that  have  a  faculty  of  forgetting  their  un- 
pleasant experiences  and  exaggerate   their  joys 
and  success.     We   divided   the   game  with  the 

82 


HUNTERS  WHO  HAVii:  BU.CKFEVERED 
Goose  Island  camp  and  returned  to   our   camp 
in  the   evening,   but   t  always  remembered  my 
poor  shooting  as  well  as  the  good.     We  moral- 
ized on  the  question;  was  it  a  fault  of  the   guns 
or   had   the  hunters  an  attack  of  the  buck  fever 
or  was  it  Providence  or   chance  or  did  the  guns 
have   spasms   that   governed    in    this    case   is 
something  that  I    could   not  quite   understand. 
For  never  before  in  all  my  long   hunting  experi- 
ence have  I  seen  such  shooting  as  was  done  on 
this  hunt.     I  have  witnessed   many   remarkable 
shots.     Geese  and  ducks  have  been  pulled  down 
out  of  the  sky.     Deer  have  been  shot  and  killed 
a  fourth  of  a  mile  away  and  many   other   mira- 
culous shots  made.     I   saw   Father  shoot   and 
kill  a  hoot-owl  one  night  about  nine-thirty  when 
it  was  so  dark  that  you  could  not   see   the   tree 
that  the  owl  was  in.     A  big  hoot-owl  had  lit   in 
a  big  oak  tree  near  the   cabin   and  commenced 
to  hoot  "who-are-you."     Father  took  down  the 
old  squirrel  rifle  and  shot  in  the   direction   from 
which  the  sound  came.      At   the   crack   of  the 

83 


PIONEER  HUNTERS  OF  THE  KANKAKEE 
rifle   down   came   something   clattering   to   the 
ground.     I  took  the  dog  and  found  the  owl.  dead 
as  a  knob. 


CHAPTER  VIII 
TRAPPERS'  CLAIMS 

TRAPPERS'   CLAIMS 

AND   HOW   THEY    WERE 

OBTAINED.      THE   BEE-TREE 

SWINDLE  AND  HOW 

IT  WAS  WORKED 

It  was  away  back  in  1868.  Think  of  it.  Fifty 
years  ago  when  1  made  my  first  appearance  in 
the  Kankakee  Swamps.  Since  then  I  have 
hunted  in  swamps  and  on  mountains,  in  the  big 
forests  and  on  the  plains,  but  none  clings  to  my 
memory  quite  so  well  as  when  my  thoughts 
ramble  to  the  days  when  1  was  trapping  the  fur- 
bearing  animals  in  the  Kankakee  region.  There 
are  many  very  funny  things  happened  in  those 
I  old  hunting  days.  I  told  my  early  experiences 
I  in  the  fi'rst  chapter  of  this  book  from  the  angle  of 
a  pioneer  hunter  of  the  west,  although  it  did  not 

85 


PIONEER  HUNTERS  OP^  THE  KANtCAKlEE 
all  center  in  the  Kankakee  Swamps  then  as  it 
has  in  later  years,  for  many  big  hunts  that  won 
me  fame  was  west  of  the  /Mississippi  River, 
years  ago.  Whilst  writing  this  story  and  talking 
with  ©Id  friends  I  have  been  living  over  those 
old  days.  It  has  freshened  memories  of  inci- 
dents that  1  have  not  thought  of  for  years.  In 
the  early  60's.  during  the  Civil  War.  the  price  of 
furs  of  all  kinds  went  up.  A  mink  hide  would 
sell  from  four  to  nine  dollars  each.  A  good 
coon  skin  would  bring  four  dollars  and  a  half, 
just  as  it  was  nailed  on  the  shanty  door,  and  the 
fur  buyer  would  pull  the  nails  himself.  All  kinds 
of  furs  brought" a  good  price  and  for  this  reason 
many  hunters  were  brought  to  the  Kankakee 
Swamps.  Also  many  trappers  were  brought 
here.  Up  to  this  time  the  pioneer  trappers  had 
no  established  trapping  grounds  as  there  was  a 
vast  territory  along  the  river  covered  with  water 
the  whole  year  round  which  furnished  good  trap- 
ping grounds  anywhere.  He  saw  that  his  rights 
were  slipping  from  him  and  that  he  would   soon 

86 


TRAPPERS'  CLAIMS 
be  crowded  out  of  a  trapping  ground.  So  some 
of  the  old  pioneer  trappers  got  to'gether  and  es- 
tablished what  is  known  as  a  trappers'  claim. 
Some  held  certain  claims  upon  rights  of  per- 
mission, others  from  permission  of  the  land- 
owners, while  still  others  had  bought  their 
grounds.  These  trapping  grounds  or  claims,  as 
they  were  sometimes  called,  were  divided  by  a 
line  running  north  and  south  as  the  river  is  sup- 
posed to  flow  from  the  northeast  in  a  south- 
western course.  So  the  miles  on  the  river  v/ere 
the  base  lines  of  the  claims  and  extended  on 
both  sides  of  the  river  just  as  far  as  it  was  pro- 
fitable and  ran  all  the  way  from  two  to  ten  miles 
in  width.  Therefore  there  were  a  good  many 
trapping  grounds  lying  between  the  Indiana 
State  line  and  English  Lake.  These  claims 
were  bought  and  sold  almost  the  same  as  real 
estate  and  they  v/ere  about  as  strong  in  their 
stipulation  as  the  Clayton-Bulwort  treaty.  They 
have  brought  many  a  trapper  on  the  verge  ©f 
war.     Ameng  the  early  trappers   who   came    in 

87 


PIONEfiR  HUNTKRS  OF  THE  KANKAKEE 
the  late  fifties  and  early  sixties  were:  Joshua  E. 
Essex,  better  known  among  the  old-time  hunt- 
ers as  "Essex,  the  Beehunter"  from  the  fact  that 
he  was  one  of  the  greatest  wild  bee  hunters  that 
ever  hunted  the  Kankakee  region.  He  began 
hunting  and  trapping  in  185  9  in  partnership 
with  J.  E.  Gilson,  of  whom  mention  has  been 
made.  They  built  a  log  cabin  on  v/hat  is  known 
as  Butternut  Ridge  and  near  the  Swift  Cut  Off. 
Here  he  trapped  for  three  years  then  went  into 
partnership  with  Charles  Cassel  and  on  Shinty 
Island  built  a  shanty  and  trapped  three  yc-'ars. 
In  the  summer  of  1862  he  enlisted  and  was  en- 
rolled in  Company  1,  5th  Regiment.  Indiana 
Cavalry.  He  was  Quartermaster  Sergeant  and 
served  to  the  close  of  the  war.  being  discharged 
on  June  15.  1865,  when  he  returned  and  again 
went  into  the  swamps  and  continued  hunting 
and  trapping  until  1880.  /Aost  of  his  time  in 
the  swamps  v/as  spent  in  hunting  bees.  He  be- 
came famous  as  a  bee  hunter.  After  retiring 
from  the  trapping  business  for    many  years    he 


TRAPPERS'  CLAIMS 
devoted  his  time  to  the  bee  culture,  having  in 
the  meantime  invented  and  patented  a  bee  hive 
which  he  manufactured  and  sold.  It  v/as  a 
great  improvement  over  the  old-fashioned  bee 
hive.  In  the  winter  of  1867  Samuel  Irvin  be- 
gan trapping  and  built  a  shanty  on  Little  Beach 
Ridge,  Eben  Buck,  an  old  pioneer  river  man, 
was  his  skinner  and  fur  dresser.  It  is  said  that 
Buck  could  skin  and  dress  more  hides  in  an 
hour  than  any  two  trappers  on  the  river.  In 
stretching  and  dressing  a  rat  hide  he  was  an 
expert.  In  the  fall  of  '71  Irvin  built  a  shanty  on 
Quinn's  Island  on  the  north  side  of  the  river  and 
a  little  below  the  north  bend.  This  shanty  he 
used  for  two  seasons  then  found  that  he  had 
been  encroaching  upon  the  rights  of  another 
trapper.  Then  he  sold  his  shanty,  to  Bill  Gran- 
ger. Polsom  moved  it  to  Red  Oak  and  placed 
it  on  the  site  of  the  one  that  was  burned  in  '73, 
In  the  same  year  Irvin  bought  another  claim  or 
rather  two  claims,  the  Indian  Garden  Claim  and 
the  Crooked  Creek  Claim,     This  purchase   ex- 

89 


PIONEER  HUNl^ERS  OF  THE  KANKAKEE 
tended  his  trapping  grounds  up  the  river  as  far 
as  Crooked  Creek.  lie  built  a  shanty  on  Indian 
Garden  near  the  mouth  of  Sandy  Hook.  Late 
in  the  Pall  of  '79,  after  the  fall  catch,  he  sold  his 
claim  including  shanty,  boats  and  traps  to  the 
Sherwood  Brothers,  Jerry  and  Holland,  for  one 
hundred  and  fifty  dollars.  He  also  realized  one 
hundred  and  forty  dollars  from  one  month's 
trapping,  thus  retiring  from  the  business  after 
spending  twelve  years  of  successful  trapping  oii 
the  Kankakee.  The  latch  string  of  /Ar  Irvin's 
shanty  door  always  hung  out  to  all  hunters  and 
fishermen  from  far  and  near  and  they  were  hos- 
pitably treated  and  entertained,  The  Sherv/oods 
trapped  the  ground  one  or  two  seasons,  then 
sold  out  and  moved  to  Tennessee.  Another 
very  successful  trapper  in  those  days  was  H.  G. 
Castle  who  began  trapping  with  his  cousin. 
Charles  Castle.  They  trapped  in  the  Shanty 
Island  ground  for  several  years  and  bought  furs. 
He  retired  in  '82  and  engaged  in  the  mercantile 
business  at  Hebron   Indiana.     By    1882    nearly 

90 


TRAPPERS'  CLAIMS 
all  the  old-timers  had  left  the  swamps.  Turs 
were  getting  cheap  and  hardly  worth  catching. 
But  a  few  years  later  prices  began  to  go  up  and 
then  the  younger  generation  took  up  the  trap- 
ping business.  Now  as  1  have  gone  to  the  limit 
of  this  story  or  what  I  promised  in  the  begin- 
ning, The  Pioneer  Hunters  and  Trappers,  1  will 
leave  the  latter  day  hunters  for  the  second  edi- 
tion. The  reader  remembers  1  said  that  Essex 
was  a  great  bee  hunter  and  to  my  mind  he  was. 
But  he  had  many  close  rivals  in  hunting  for 
wild  honey.  Now  I  will  tell  you  of  one  of  the 
shrewdest  bee  hunters  that  ever  operated  in  the 
Kankakee  Swamps,  lie  said  that  "there  are 
tricks  to  all  trades"  and  a  stunt  that  he  puUed 
off  and  got  away  with,  or  rather  a  "joke"  as  he 
called  it  surely  proves  the  assertion  of  good  or 
evil  repute  of  past  Sawyers  or  Sawyers  yet  to 
grow,  lienry  3.  Sawyer  was  related  io  the  /Ar. 
Sawyer  who  many  years  ago  ran  the  Eatons 
Perry  and  of  which  1  v/ill  speak  later.  This  young 
hunter  who  originated  in    Kentucky  but  later  at 

91 


PIONEER  HUNTERS  OF  THE  KANKAKEE 
Big  Log,  Indiana,  has  friends  who  have  deter- 
mined that  he  is  a  natural  born  hunter  (Ken- 
tucky produces  a  large  crop  of  such).  Sawyer 
was  long  armed  and  amiable.  f^rom  many 
years  of  practice  in  hunting  and  shooting  wild 
fowls,  deer  and  wild  hogs  and  other  game  which 
inhabitated  the  Kankakee  region  had  a  fairly 
cerrect  notion  of  his  own  about  hunting,  /Aany 
of  the  sportsmen  from  the  city  would  employ 
him  and  turn  over  their  camp  to  him  and  at 
night  he  would  teach  them  local  geography  of 
the  Kankakee  region.  In  a  fev/  years  he  be- 
came known  to  almost  all  the  sportsmen  in  the 
nearby  cities,  The  business  of  a  guide  in  those 
days  was  to  push  a  boat  through  the  swamps, 
bayous  and  sand  marshes  with  one,  and  some- 
times two,  hunters  in  it.  At  times  there  was 
much  hard  work  to  perform,  especially  in  the 
fall  hunt  when  the  water  was  low.  in  a  year  or 
two  he  grew  tired  of  this  business  and  his 
thoughts  seemed  to  consist  as  far  as  might  be 
to  avoid  work.     And  here  he  invented  his  prac- 

92 


TRAPPERS'  CLAIMS 
tical  "'joke,"  Sawyer  was  struck  on  the  idea  of 
bee-hunting,  As  he  was  well  known  by  all  of 
the  old  bee  hunters  along  the  Kankakee  he  was 
welcomed  as  joyously  at  a  bee  hunters  cabin  as 
if  he  were  a  long  missing  brother.  He  was  at 
once  made  to  be  at  home  in  the  bee  hunters 
cabin  on  Long  Ridge,  whilst  the  old  hunter  en- 
tered with  a  friendly  rivalry  with  the  young  hun- 
ter in  the  giving  of  advice  and  information.  After 
visiting  a  number  of  the  old-time  bee  hunters 
who  resided  among  the  sand  ridges  along  the 
river,  one  of  them  v/as  Honey  Bee  Sawyer.  He 
thought  he  had  the  secret  so  he  began  looking 
for  wild  bees  that  stored  their  honey  in  hollow 
trees  which  were  called  bee  trees.  Honey  sold 
at  a  good  price  in  those  days  as  there  were  not 
many  hunters  engaged  in  the  business.  When 
Sawyer  began  hunting  the  wild  bees  it  was  in 
the  Autumn  of  "59".  At  that  time  there  were 
several  good  bee  hunters  in  the  swamp  among 
whom  I  might  mention  the  Steven  brothers, 
/Aarion    and    Pilander,    Harrison     Dolson,    Joe 

93 


PIONEER  HUNTERS  OF  THE  KANKAKEE 
Cason.    Mad  Folsom,    Charles   Carmon.   and  a 
score  of  others  that   were   very   successful   bee 
hunters.     They  were  all  old  timers  who  had  fol- 
lowed the  business  for  years.     Sawyer  was  green 
at  bee  hunting  as  1  said  before,  but  he  hit  on  a 
scheme  that  worhed  and  laid  the  old  bee  hunters 
in  the  shade.     He  was  always  a  lucky  hunter. 
Good   luck  seemed  always   at   his  hand.     No 
matter  what  the  game  was  he  pursued,  he  al- 
v/ays  was  sure  to  bag  it,  and  so  the  same  luck 
followed  him  iu  the  bee  hunting  business.     He 
found  two  or  three  trees,  cut  them,  and  they  pro- 
ved good,  getting  from  sixty  to  one-hundred  and 
fifty  pounds  per  tree.     Being  a  good  season  for 
honey,  as  there  were  lots  of  wild  flowers  for  the 
bees  to  work  on.  Sawyer  concieved  the  idee   to 
mark  every  tree  that  he  found  that  had  a  hole  in 
it,  to  mark  them  all  bee  trees,  generally  picking 
on  trees  that  were  easily  climbed.     He  had  a 
pair  of  climbers  made  something  on  the  order 
that  telegraph  linemen  use.     He  had  everything 
in  readiness  and  just  as  soon  as  the  frost  came 

94 


TRAPPERS'  CLAIMS 
and  killed  the  flowers  so  the  bees  would  have  to 
work  on  bait  he  was  ready  for  them.  As  i  said 
nearly  every  tree  with  a  hole  in  it  had  his  name 
on  it  and  it  is  very  seldom  that  you  hear  of  a 
marked  bee  tree  being  desturbed.  Before  close 
of  the  bee  hunting  season  Sawyer  went  around 
lo  all  the  trees  that  he  had  his  name  on,  climbed 
them,  stuck  some  honey-comb  inside  of  the  tree 
and  smeared  honey  all  around  the  hole  so  that 
all  the  neighborhood  bees  would  v/ork  on  the 
honey,  passing  in  and  out  of  the  hole  in  the 
hollow  tree.  This  the  b2es  will  do  late  in  the 
Fall  when  the  flowers  are  gone.  After  baiting 
about  sixty-five  or  seventy  trees  in  this  way, 
having  three  or  four  live  trees,  genuine  bee  trees, 
he  announced  his  trees  for  sale  and  in  a  few 
days  he  had  his  victim  coming.  Some  settlers 
from  the  ridges,  hearing  of  the  result  of  some  of 
Sawyer's  bee  trees,  concluded  there  was  a 
chance  for  speculation,  so  some  of  them  visited 
the  young  bee  hunter  who  had  a  shanty  on 
Buck's  Ridge,  with  a  view  of  buying  some  of  his 

95 


PIONEER  HUNTERS  OF  THE  KANKAKl'K 
trees.  As  good  luck  would  have  it,  it  was  a 
warm,  sunny  day  in  the  middle  of  October  and 
the  bees  worked  on  bait  nicely.  Sawyer  lOok 
them  through  the  swamp,  over  ridges  and 
showed  them  his  stock  of  bee  trees.  The  bees 
were  working  strong,  going  in  and  out  of  the 
trees,  indicating  a  strong  swarm.  Sounding  the 
trees  with  the  pole  of  an  axe  gave  them  some 
idea  as  to  the  hollow  V.''.-^i  the  tree  might  con- 
tain. After  examining  the  trees,  mig  party  re- 
turned to  the  cabin  late  in  the  afternoon-~tired, 
wet  and  hungry.  The  trapper  who  was  shanty- 
ing  with  him  had  a  kettle  of  stewed  duck,  boiled 
potatoes,  bread,  butter  and  coffee,  which  made 
a  fairly  good  supper.  Sawyer  asked  them  three 
dollars  and  fifty  cents  a  tree  and  showed  them 
the  honey  that  he  took  out  of  a  tree  that  he  cui. 
Me  said  he  had  sold  six  dollars'  worth  of  honey 
and  if  they  doubted  his  statement  they  could  ask 
/Ar.  Smith,  the  man  v/ho  helped  him  cut  the  tree 
and  take  the  honey  out.  The  settlers  hesitated 
for  awhile,  bui  finally  said  they  v/ould  give    him 

96 


TRAPPERS'  CLAIMS 
two  dollars  and  fifty  cents  a  tree  for  sixty-five 
trees.  There  were  three  trees  on  the  north  side 
of  the  river  they  did  not  want.  Sawyer  did  not 
want  to  miss  a  sale  so  he  said  that  he  would 
cut  two  trees  near  the  cabin  and  if  they  did  not 
g'st  more  than  one  hundred  and  fifty  pounds 
from  the  two  trees  he  would  take  the  two 
fifty.  And  if  there  was  more  than  that  they 
were  to  give  him  the  three  fifty.  To  tn is  they 
agreed.  They  went  to  cut  the  trees  and  from 
the  first  one  they  Q'ot  a  little  over  one  hundred 
pounds  of  nice  honey  The  other  tree  was  still 
better.  They  soon  closed  the  deal.  Sawyer 
was  to  help  them  cut  the  trees  and  the  tiiiie  was 
decided  on  the  first  freeze  up  v/hen  the  ice 
v/ould  carry  them  safely,  as  that  would  b-^  the 
best  time  to  get  around  in  the  sv/amp  and  get 
the  honey  out.  The  bargoin  was  closed  and 
Sawyer  received  his  money,  two  hundred  and 
twenty -seven  dollars  for  five  bee  trees,  whilst 
the  sixty  trees  contained  nothing  but  tlic  hol- 
lows.     Not  a  bee  in  the  whole  sixiv  trees  or  for 

97 


PIONEER  HUNTERS  OF  THE  KANKAKEE 
a  long  time  afterwards.  This  was  hnown  as  the 
"hollow  tree  sale."  Just  before  or  about  the 
time  of  the  first  freeze  Sawyer  left  the  ridge  and 
a  paper  informing  the  settlers  that  all  kinds  of 
things  happen  in  the  Kankakee  Swamps,  he 
took  the  map  of  the  Kankakee  valley  and  de- 
parted. A  few  days  later  the  settlers  came  and 
had  a  bee  tree  cutting.  They  cut  several  trees 
and  did  not  find  any  honey  nor  be:?3  but  found  a 
piece  of  honey-comb  on  a  string  inside  the  tree. 
This  led  them  to  believe  that  they  had  been 
tr'cked.  They  went  to  their  homes  much  wiser, 
but  with  no  honey.  What  they  said  of  their  ex- 
perience was  never  knov/n.  A  fev/  days  after 
this  an  old  bee  hunter  asked  one  of  them  hov/ 
much  honey  they  got.  fie  drew  a  long  hunting 
knife  and  threatened  the  inquirer.  The  other 
settlers  were  questioned  not  at  all.  It  v/as  one 
of  thp  shrev/dest  tricks  ever  pulled  off  in  the  his- 
tory o'"  the  Kankakee  Valley,  liis  feme  as  a 
bee  hunter  went  abroad  all  over  Northern  In- 
diana and  he  was  thence  after  knov/n  as  Honey 

98 


TRAPPERS'  CLAIMS 
Bee  Sawyer,  and  this  done  on  his  achievement 
is  not  dimmed  or  forgotten,  father  was  quite  a 
successful  bee  hunter  and  in  early  days  kept 
the  home  supplied  with  wild  honey  all  the  year 
round  and  from  him  1  got  my  early  training  in 
bee  hunting.  Although  I  never  hunted  for  bees 
very  much  yet  it  is  one  of  the  sweetest  hunts 
that  a  man  can  engage  in.  1  never  found  very 
many  bee  trees  and  what  1  did  find  I  found 
mostly  when  1  was  not  looking  for  them.  V/hen 
a  boy  1  used  to  go  with  Pather  when  he  went 
bee  hunting  In  the  fall  of  the  year  after  the 
frost  had  killed  the  wild  flowers  the  bees  would 
work  on  bait  and  by  putting  some  honey-comb, 
stuck  on  a  stick,  in  som.e  open  place,  then 
watch  for  the  bees,  and  if  there  are  any  bees 
within  a  half  mile  they  will  come  to  the  bait  and 
after  they  have  loaded  themselves  with  honey 
they  will  rise,  circle  around  once  or  twice  then 
start  straight  for  hcmiC.  Then  the  hunter  gets 
the  line  on  the  direction  of  the  tree.  Possibly 
many     of    you    have    heard    the    old    saying. 


9v 


PIONEER  HUNTERS  OF  THE  KANKAKEE 
"Straight   as   a   bee   line."      Well,  this  is  where 
that  old  saying  originated.     A  bee  never  flies  a 
crooked  line  to  its  home  when  loaded. 


CHAPTER  IX 
RUNNING  THE  FERRY 

THE   PIONEER 

BRIDGE   BUILDERS   CARRYING 

THE    UNITED   STATES   MAIL  THROUGH 

THE   KANKAKEE  SWAMPS 

IN   A   CANOE 

Away  back  in  the  chilly  autumn  of  1836, 
George  Eaton,  with  his  family,  landed  on  the 
banks  of  the  Kankakee  River  at  a  place  known 
in  the  early  days  as  Pottowati.Qmie,  Pord,.,  .He 
built  a  log  cabin  on  the  right  "-bank'  of  the'r'iver. 
He  was  one  of  the  couragepy':^',  'gi^ti^'e;i:  i'^,eii\e,i^\ 
redeemed  the  country  from  superstition  and 
savagery.  He  began  pioneer  life  as  a  ferryman 
and  ran  what  w^as  known  as  the  Eaton  Perry. 
He  would  transfer  people  from  the  Porter 
county  side  to  the  sand  ridges  in  Jasper  county. 
At  the  season  of  the  year  when  the   water  was 

101 


PIONEER  HUNTERS  OF  THE  KANKAKEE 
high  the  distance  was  about  a  mile   and   a  half 
and  part  .of  the  way  was  through  a  dense  swamp 
and  a  pathless  marsh.     In  1847  or  1848  there 
was  a  United  States  mail  route  established   be- 
tween /Aichigan  City  and    Rensselaer,    Indiana, 
and  /Ar.  Eaton  had   the   contract   to   carry  the 
mail   across   the   Kankakee  Swamps.     In   the 
winter  time  v/as   the   riveF  and   marshes   were 
frozen  up  it  was  somewhat  difficult.     But  in  the 
summer  season  when  the  water  was  low   the 
mail  was  either  carried  through  the  swamps  and 
marshes  on  horse  back  or  stage.     In  the  winter 
of   "49"   Eaton   built  a  bridge   across  the  river. 
This  was  the  first  bridge  built  on  the  Kankakee 
above  /Aomcnce,  111.     On  the  fotlowing  summer 
it' was  burned,it  's  supposed  on  account  of  it  be- 
ing atoll  bridge.     A\r.  Eaton  continued  to  run  the 
the  ferry  up  to  the  time  of  his  death  which  oc- 
cured  in  1851.     His  remains  were  laid  at  rest  on 
a  beautiful  knoll  near  the  landing  place.     /Ars. 
Eaton,    a   woman    of    remarkable    nerve    and 
strength,  continued  to  run  the  ferry  and  deliver 

102 


±  ^ 


t    c    cc  c    c 


RUNNING  THE  FERRY 
the  mail  on  tiie  south  side.  At  times  the  water 
was  so  high  that  it  could  not  be  carried  by  stage- 
As  1  have  said,  she  was  a  woinan  of  couragg  and 
strength  and  there  were  but  few  men  wiio  could 
excel  her  with  the  oars.  One  morning  about 
daybreak  two  men  on  horseback  arrived  at  the 
ferry  and  wanted  to  be  hastily  transiered  to  the 
main  land  on  the  south  side.  They  said  they 
had  lo  be  in  Rennsselaer  by  noon,  as  there  was 
going  to  be  a  Government  land  sale  at  one  o'- 
clock that  day  and  they  wanted  to  be  there  at  the 
opening  of  the  sale.  The  recent  rains  had  raised 
the  v/ater  in  the  river  and  marshes  that  one- 
fourth  of  the  way  across  would  swim  a  horse. 
Through  the  timber  they  could  ride  their  horses 
as  the  water  v/as  from,  knee  to  belly  deep  to  a 
horse.  Ars.  Eaton  told  them  she  could  ferry 
them  over  one  at  a  time  but  it  would  delay  them 
about  an  hour  and  a  half  or  she  could  take  them 
both  over  e.t  the  same  time  and  that  there  were 
places  thej  they  could  swim  their  horses  and 
that  they  could  ride  their   horses  until  the  water 

103 


PIONEER  HUNTERS  OF  THE  KANKAK.EE 
got  too  deep  to  wade  then  they  could  get  Into 
the  boat  and  swim  the  horses  alongside  the 
boat.  They  decided  to  go  together  and  took 
passage  per  "skiff  and  horseback  riding  their 
horses  when  it  wasn't  too  deep.  In  less  than 
an  hour  they  were  landed  safely  at  Sand  Ridge 
Landing  in  Jasper  County.  This  is  one  inci- 
dent mentioned  which  is  only  one  ot  the  many 
daring  feats  of  this  kind  in  which  lArs.  Eaton 
showed  her  skill  as  a  boat's  woman.  Late  in 
the  afternoon  of  the  next  day  the  sheriff  of  La- 
porte  County,  Indiana,  arrived  in  the  ferry  look- 
ing for  tv/o  stolen  horses  taken  from  a  farmer 
near  Doorville  and  the  description  of  the  men 
and  horses  tallied  v/ith  those  that  Ars.  Eaton 
ferried  across  the  river.  There  is  no  doubt  but 
that  they  were  the  men  v/anted  at  Laporte. 
The  chances  for  getting  away  and  hiding  stolen 
horses  in  the  sand  ridges  on  the  south  side  of 
the  river  v/as  much  better  than  on  the  north 
side  as  the  country  was  not  so  well  settled. 
Aany  a  stolen  horse  has   been  hidden  away  on 

104 


RUNNING  THE  FERRY 
these  swamp  islands  which  were  never  found 
by  their  owners.  Horse  stealing  in  those  days 
was  a  very  frequent  occurence.  I'Ars.  Eaton 
died  in  1857  and  was  buried  beside  her  hus- 
band in  the  family  burying  ground  near  the 
landing.  After  the  death  of  /'Ars.  Eaton  a  man 
by  the  name  oi  Saw/er  C3.ne  in  possession  of 
the  old  ferry.  He  built  a  bridge  in  "57."  As 
the  bridge  was  not  substantially  built  the  ice 
and  high  water  of  the  following  spring  took  it 
out.  Sawyer  then  ran  the  ferry  again  and  car- 
ried mail  for  three  or  four  years.  He  also  put 
up  a  sawmill  on  the  banks  of  ihe  river  and  did  a 
good  lumber  business.  Aany  of  the  logs  he 
sawed  were  rafted  down  the  river.  in  1860  he 
sold  out  his  business  to  cnus  5aum,  who  oper- 
ated the  mill  and  ran  the  ferry  for  a  few  years. 
Baum  built  a  bridge  that  stayed  in  and  was 
used  until  the  close  of  the  war  when  the  County 
Commissioners  of  Porter  and  Jasper  Counties 
jointly  took  over  the  bridge  and  made  it  free. 
Later  on  they  made  a  grade  through  the  swamp 

105 


PIONEER  HUNTERS  OF  THE  ICANKIAKEE 
of  timber  and  sand  as  far  as  the  timber  line.  It 
was  several  years  before  the  grade  was  com- 
pleted across  the  marsh  to  the  dry  land.  This 
was  the  last  of  the  toll  gate  system  in  Porter 
County.  In  fact,  it  was  the  last  in  Northern  In- 
diana. When  Baum  built  the  bridge  it  stayed 
in.  This  was  knov/n,  and  is  to  this  day,  as 
Baum's  Bridge.  And  yet  Eaton  built  a  bridge 
across  the  river  at  the  same  place  fourteen 
years  prior  to  the  building  of  the  Baum's  Bridge. 
It  was  at  this  ford  that  /Aajor  Irwin  crossed  the 
Kankakee  when  he  was  giving  notice  to  all  the 
Indians  along  the  Kankakee  Swamps  to  be 
ready  to  leave  in  the  early  summicr  for  their 
homes  beyond  the  /Aississippi.  Also  it  was  at 
this  ford  where  General  Tipton  crossed  the  river 
while  gathering  up  the  children  of  the  forest  to 
their  far-off  hunting  grounds  toward  the  sunset. 
In  1878  a  party  of  hunters  from  Pittsburg,  Pa., 
built  a  club  house  at  the  bridge  and  they  put  on 
the  river  a  small  steamer,  "Little  Rhoda"  which 
played  between  English  Lake  and  Long    Ridge. 

106 


^     i   3  i    . 


>U^ 


RUNNING  THE  FERRY 
There  was  another  party  of  hunters  from  Louis- 
ville, Kentucky,  who  built  a  club  house  at  the 
bridge  in  the  fall  of  "78  known  as  the  Louisville 
Hunting  Club  with  Wm.  Thompson,  of  Louisville 
as  President  and  H.  Parker  Rice  and  Aaron  P. 
Perman,  of  Hebron,  Indiana,  as  hunting  guides 
and  club  house  managers.  Parker,  better 
known  as  "Dock"  among  the  hunting  circles, 
became  associated  with  the  Louisville  Club  in 
their  annual  fall  hunt  of  '76  and  at  that  time 
they  camped  in  a  cotton  shanty  or  rag-house  as 
they  are  sometimes  called,  near  the  Prairie 
Bend.  The  next  season  they  built  a  shanty 
where  now  stands  their  magnificent  building 
v/hich  was  erected  in  '78  by  Dock  Rice,  archi- 
tect and  builder.  On  the  following  year,  '79, 
another  club  house  v/as  built  by  a  hunting  club 
known  as  the  "White  House  Club"  with  George 
Wilcox,  of  Baum's  Bridge,  as  manager  and 
hunting  guide.  In  the  hunting  season  of  the 
feathery  tribe  many  are  the  sportsmen  that 
gather  along  the  marshes  of  the    Kankakee   to 

107 


PIONEER  HUNTERS  OF  THE  KANKAKEE 
get  a  shot  at  a  web-foot  duck,  and  many  years 
hunting  on  this  stream  have  brought  me  face  to 
face  with  many  good  fellows  that  belong  to  the 
hunters'  fraternity.  Some  of  my  most  pleasant 
recollections  that  were  printed  on  my  memory 
v/ere  scenes  around  a  hunters'  camp.  I  have 
often  regretted  I  did  not  keep  a  diary  for  many 
of  the  talks  around  these  campfires  are  worth 
recording. 


H 

CD 

r 

o 

c 


o 

c 

n> 


c 


CO 
CO 


CHAPTER  X 

LAST  OF  THE  POTTO WATTO MIES 

FIRING 

THE  MARSHES   TO 

DRIVE  THE   GAME   OUT. 

HOW  THE  INDIANS  ROAST  A  DEER   HEAD. 

THE  LAST  OF  THE 

POTTOWA-TTOMiES 

ON  THE  KANKAKEE 

The  readers  remember  that  in  a  previous 
chapter  I  mentioned  that  a  few  of  the  Potto- 
wattomie  Indians  were  permitted  to  remain. 
Now  I  will  teil  you  what  became  of  AVingo,  the 
little  Indian  boy.  One  of  the  most  wonderful 
stories  of  all  is  a  prairie  on  fire,  which  is  one  of 
the  grandest  sights  in  the  v/orid.  1  have  seen, 
in  the  fall  of  the  year  in  a  dry  time,  the  Kanka- 
kee Prairies  on  fire,  the  time  of  the  sear  and 
yellow  leaf  when  all  nature  is  about  to  put  off 
her  garb  of  green  and  put  on  the  v/hite-snow. 
The  Indians  sometimes  would  set  the  grass  on 

108 


PIONEER  HUNTERS  OF  THE  KANKAKLEE 
fire  to  drive  the  game  out.  If  there  is  any  wind 
going  It  sweeps  like  a  mighty  hurricane  and  car- 
ries everything  before  it.  Sometimes  you  can 
burn  the  grass  around  you  and  escape  before 
the  raging  billows  of  fire  reach  you.  "One  time 
many  years  ago,"  says  an  old  hunter,  "Aubbee- 
naubbee  and  /'Aingo,  an  Indian  boy,  and  myself, 
were  out  hunting  in  the  tall  grass  and  weeds  on 
the  marshes  about  two  miles  from  the  river.  We 
had  killed  a  deer  and  had  just  cut  it  open  and 
taken  out  its  entrails  and  were  preparing  to  skin 
it  and  cut  it  up  so  that  we  could  carry  it  home, 
when  we  heard  a  roaring  and  crackling  noise 
west  of  us  like  the  coming  of  a  mighty  storm. 
Aubbeenaubbee,  with  terror  despicted  on  his 
face,  said  that  the  prairie  was  on  fire  and  that 
we  must  get  out.  As  the  wind  was  blowing 
hard  from  that  direction  we  knew  that  it  v/ouid 
soon  be  upon  us  and  we  knew  that  there  was  no 
salvation  for  /Aingo  in  the  tali  grass  as  he  was 
small.  In  the  twinkling  of  an  eye  we  opened 
out   the   deer   and   shoved   /Aingo   in  and  then 

109 


LAST  OF  THE  POTTOWATTOMIES 
closed  it  up  like  a  clam.  Aubbeenaubbee  and  I 
then  broke  and  ran  for  our  lives  and  of  all  the 
running  and  tumbling  and  summersaults  in  the 
tall  grass  beat  the  world  and  all  the  rest  of  man- 
kind. I  took  a  straight  shoot  for  the  river  but 
Aubbeenaubbee  took  off  to  the  left  of  me  and 
reached  the  pond  or  slough  with  some  water 
and  musk-rat  houses  in  it  and  he  rushed  in  and 
hurriedly  tore  off  the  top  of  an  old  musk-rat 
house  and  jumped  in  and  was  saved.  After 
running  hard  and  being  almost  given  out  of  be- 
ing overtaken  by  the  fire  1  reached  a  creek  near 
the  river  where  there  was  some  water.  I  cross- 
ed over  and  was  safe  on  the  other  side  of  the 
Jordan.  Then  i  stood  with  wonder  and  am.aze- 
ment  at  the  glorious  sight  of  the  ocean  of  fire 
rolling  by  and  some  deer  and  v/olves  rushed  by 
me  in  their  fright  to  escape  the  scorching  ele- 
ments. But  1  paid  no  attention  to  them.  After 
the  fire  had  passed  by  it  had  left  nothing  but  a 
blackened  pall.  1  started  to  find  my  compan- 
ions and  found  Aubbeenaubbee   with   his   head 

110 


PIONEER  HUNTERS  OF  THE  ICAN  KAK.EE 
stuck  out  of  a  musk-rat  house,  all  right  except 
a  little  scorched  about  the  head.  But  he  was 
clad  to  get  off  with  that.  He  crawled  out  of  the 
old  musk-rat  house  and  started  to  look  for 
/Aingo  as  we  had  great  fear  for  him,  fearing  that 
he  had  been  roasted  alive.  We  found  the 
roasted  deer  and  knocked  at  the  door  and  to 
our  great  delight  /Aingo  called  out,  '5it  down 
you  are  at  the  right  door'"  And  we  opened  the 
deer  and  behold,  he  was  safe  and  sound,  al- 
though he  said  it  was  red-hot  for  him  for  a  short 
time.  The  deer  was  roasted  to  a  nice  brown  on 
the  outside  and  we  sat  down  and  made  a  square 
meal  off  of  him.  Then  we  cut  it  up  and  carried 
it  home  and  we  had  enough  to  eat  for  sometime 
without  cooking."  The  finest  bill  of  fare  that  I 
ever  saw  was  to  pass  over  the  burnt  district  just 
after  a  big  fire  had  passed  and  you  could  find 
all  kinds  of  game;  coon,  rabbits,  and  sometimes 
prairie  chickens  and  ducks,  nicely  roasted  and 
many  a  meal  have  I  made  of  them  when  out 
hunting  and  hungry.  1  will  tell  y@u  how  the  In- 
Ill 


LAST  OF  THE  POTTOWATTOMIES 

dians  cooked  their  mgats  and  the  way  they  roast 
a  deer  head,  it  is  the  finest  and  most  delicious 
in  the  world.  They  dig  a  hole  about  a  foot 
square  and  about  a  foot  deep  and  inake  a  hot 
fire  in  it  and  keep  it  burning  until  it  is  nearly  lull 
oi  red  hot  coals.  Then  scrape  out  the  coals  and 
ashes.  Wrap  the  deer  head  with  the  skin  on  in 
wet  leaves  and  place  it  in  the  hole  and  cover  it 
up  with  the  hot  ashes  and  coals  and  leave  it  un- 
til it  is  roasted  through,  then  take  it  out  and  the 
skin  will  peel  off  and  leave  a  clean,  tender  meat. 
Brains  and  tongue  are  all  nicely  cooked  and 
that  throws  v/hale  tongue  in  the  shade.  You 
can  cook  fish  just  caught  in  the  same  way.  You 
wrap  the  fish  in  a  wet  paper  of  any  kind  and 
lay  the  fish  down  and  cover  it  up  with  hot  ashes 
and  coals  just  as  you  would  a  roast  potato  in 
the  ashes.  After  it  is  done  take  it  out  and  the 
paper  and  skin  peels  off  and  leaves  the  juicy 
meat  for  you  to  place  your  pepper  and  salt  and 
eat  it.  It  is  the  finest  thing  in  the  world.  You 
just  try  it  sometime  when  you  are  out   camping 

112 


PIONEliR  HUNTERS  OF  THE  KANKAICEE  :^ 

on  the  Kankakee  and  you  will  never  get  tired  of    | 
it.     One  time  on   the   Kankakee   we   were  out    \ 
fishing  for  pike  and  in   those  days  we   had    no    | 
such  fishing  outfits  as  are  used   at   the   present     ij 
time,  such  as  skinners,  trolling  hook  or  Johnson 
grabbers  or    liildebrandt's    spinner   and    many 
other  patented  fishing  hooks  and  artificial  baits. 
We  had  to  make  our  lines  and   hooks   in   those 
days  and  in  fishing  for  pike   or   pickerel    in  the 
Kankakee  we  had  to  have  strong  lines  and  stout    | 
hooks  and  bait  with  a   big  finn  of  one  of  the  fish     j 
caught.     If  you  haven't  such  a  bait  use   a    large 
frog  or  minnow  and  keep  it  moving,  as   a    pick- 
erel seldom  bites  at  a  still  bait  but  always  takes 
it  on    the    wing   and  go  for  it  like  lightning  and 
splashes   water   in  your   face  like  a  flying   sea 
horse.      Then  we  would  pull  them  in  out  of   the 
water.     One  day  we  caught  nine    pickerel    that    | 
measured   altogether  fifteen  feet.      We  cooked    \ 
them  all  up  for  supper  and  with  bread  and   but- 
ter and  coffee  the  nine  of  us  ate  them  all  up  and 
all  of  us  said  it  beat  the  world  and  all  the  rest  of 

113 


LAST  OF  THE  POTTOWATTOMIES 

mankind.  Just  think!  Nine  men  eating  fifteen 
feet  of  fish.  Another  time  we  were  fishing  on  the 
Kankakee  and  caught  many  red^horse,  buffalo, 
and  suckers.  We  ate  so  many  fish  that  some  of 
the  boys  could  not  change  their  shirts  for  three 
or  four  weeks.  Now  al!  old  hunters  and  fisher- 
men know  thai  suckers  and  red-horse  are  a  very 
bony  fish  but  just  as  good  as  any  and  some  like 
thgm  best,  only  they  are  so  full  of  bones.  1  will 
tell  you  how  we  fixed  them  and  they  were  alright. 
Take  a  sucker  and  clean  it  nicely,  then  lay  it  on 
the  slump  or  log  and  with  a  sharp  knife  cut  it 
cross-ways  into  pieces  about  an  eighth  of  an 
inch  long  stick  the  pieces  together  v/ith  cornmeal 
and  fry.  It  is  alright  and  the  bones  will  not  trou- 
ble you  or  get  cross-ways  m  your  throat.  And 
at  that  they  are  far  better  than  German  carp. 
One  time  we  were  fishing  and  caught  a  lot  of  carp 
when  some  guy  came  along  and  gave  his  idea 
and  directions  as  to  planking  carp.  His  direct- 
ions were:  Get  a  nice  big  carp  and  clean  it  in 
good  shape.     Put  it  on  a  hardwood  plank,  salt 

114 


PlONEiiR  HUNTERS  OF  THE  KANKAKEE 
and  pepper  it  well,  then  spread  a  layer  of  butter 
on  the  top.  Cover  this  with  strips  of  bacon  and 
cornmeal.  Slip  him  in  a  hot  oven  and  when 
done  to  a  brown  take  the  outfit  back  of  the  shanty 
and  throw  the  fish  away  and  eat  the  board.  I'll 
say  that  baked  suckers  and  trimmings  you  will 
find  more  palatable  than  any  hard- wood  board  or 
carp.  1  will  assure  you  that,  if  none  of  these 
dishes  don't  appeal  to  you  especially,  just  try 
something  else.  A\any  years  ago,  but  to  be  ex- 
act, it  was  the  cold  winter  of  1843  and  the  cold- 
est winter  ever  known,  there  was  a  party  of  deer 
hunters  camping  on  the  Kidge.  The  snow  was 
very  deep  and  the  weather  so  cold  that  it  was 
almost  impossible  to  get  ©ut  and  hunt  for  game. 
The  ice  in  the  river  was  so  thick  that  they  could 
not  cut  a  hole  through  it  with  an  axe  so  they 
pulled  a  lot  old  logs  on  the  ice  and  set  them  on 
fire  to  mslt  a  hole  through  it.  After  a  night  and 
a  part  of  a  day  they  got  a  hole  through  it  and  all 
kinds  of  fish,  pickerel,  bass,  salmon,  and  even 
snapping  turtles  bounded  out  of  the  ice  and  they 

115 


LAST  OF  THE  PO  1  rOWATl  OMIES 

had  fish  to  last  thein  until  the  weather  moderated 
One  old  snapping  turtle  that  came  out  was  so 
large  that  when  they  dressed  and  cooked  it.  it 
made  soup  enough  to  last  them  a  week.  The 
ice  did  not  break  up  that  Spring  until  away  in 
April.  Some  hunters  crossed  the  river  on  the  ice 
seventeenth  of  April  thai  Spring.  I  will  tell  you 
now  of  some  of  the  Indians  that  were  left  on 
the  Kankakee  and  what  became  of  little  A\ingo. 
the  Indian  boy.  /Aingo  was  the  last  Pottowat- 
tomie  on  the  Kankakee,  lie  had  been  captured 
by  the  Sioux  and  carried  away  to  the  Northwest. 
The  old  chief,  the  father  of  Niagara,  did  not  like 
/'\ingo  and  was  not  inclined  to  confer  the  honor 
on  him  he  had  so  fairly  made,  Niagara  was 
his  favorite  child  and  she  must  be  the  wife  of 
some  distinguished  personage.  But  the  old 
chief  was  doomed  to  be  outwitted  by  his  daugh- 
ter as  many  a  father  is  in  matters  of  this  kind. 
At  a  time  when  the  chief  was  absent  holding  a 
council  with  a  neighborhood  tribes  of  Sioux, 
A\ingo  picked  out  two  of  the  chief's  best   horses 

116 


PIONEER  HUNTERS  OF  THE  KANKAKEE 
on  which  to  escape  with  his  girl  to  his  own 
tribe.  Niagara  was  ready  and  when  the  village 
was  sunk  into  profound  sleep  she  met  him  in  a 
sequestered  place,  bringing  a  supply  of  provi- 
sions for  the  trip.  In  a  moment  they  were  in 
their  saddles  and  away.  They  were  not  less 
than  three  long  sleeps  from  his  own  people  and 
would  be  followed  by  the  Indians  as  long  as 
there  were  any  hopes  of  overtaking  them.  By 
morning,  however,  there  would  be  a  wide  space 
between  them  and  their  pursuers  and  would 
make  their  escape  entirely  practible  if  no  mis- 
haps should  befall  them  on  the  way.  The  first 
night  or  next  day  in  the  evening  they  reached  a 
camp  of  trappers  and  hunters  and  among  them 
were  old  Kill-buck  and  LaBonta,  Frenchmen 
who  were  trapping  and  buying  furs,  and  from 
whom  I  obtained  this  narrative  while  camped  on 
the  Kankakee  many  years.  The  trappers  were 
very  much  surprised  to  see  two  young  Indians, 
a  young  man  and  a  squaw,  rixle  up  and  alight  in 
the  midst  of  them,  apparently  much  fatigued  and 

117 


LAST  OF  THE  POTTOWAITOMIES 
way-worn.  Their  presence  required  a  prompt 
explanation,  as  tiiey  might  belong  to  some  mer- 
anders  in  that  vicinity,  who  might  give  trouble. 
The  young  Indian  made  the  pretext  of  friend- 
ship but  he  might  be  the  spy  of  a  hostile  band 
who  were  meditating  an  attack  on  them,  but 
what  means  this  pretty  young  girl  who  is  wilh 
him.  War  parties  are  never  encumbered  with 
women  and  the  faded  condition  of  their  horses 
to  some  extent  allayed  their  fears,  as  it  was 
evidence  that  they  were  on  a  long  and  severe 
journey.  Old  Kill-buck  interrogated  him  as  to 
his  object  and  destination  and  learned  that  he 
was  a  Pottowattomie  and  a  remnant  of  the 
tribe  of  the  Kankakee  and  Wabash  Rivers,  and 
who  had  been  taken  captive  about  a  year  before 
by  the  Sioux,  and  was  carried  away  by  themi  to 
their  villages  up  in  the  northwest  until  a  chance 
to  escape  to  his  own  tribe  presented  itself.  The 
young  girl  v/ith  him  v/as  Sioux,  for  whom  he 
conceived  a  fondness  while  among  her  tribe. 
The  attachment  was  not  only    mutual   but    that 

118 


PIONEER  HUNTERS  OE  THE  KANKAfCEE 
they  might  consumate  their  bliss  they  found  it 
necessary  to  eiope.  They  were  now  flying  to 
hPs  native  village  to  which  another  night's  ride 
he  thought  would  bring  them.  As  they  seemed 
very  much  fatigued  and  were  out  of  provisions, 
the  party  very  promptly  tendered  them  the  best 
they  had  which  was  consumed  with  good  relish 
by  the  two  lovers,  and  after  they  had  enjoyed  a 
little  repose  Kiil-bucH  drew  from  them  the  inci- 
dent and  story  just  related.  The  trappers  tried 
to  persuade  them  to  stay  until  morning  and  en- 
joy the  refreshments  and  rest  which  they  need- 
ed so  much,  but  he  replied  that  they  had  not 
slept  any  since  they  set  out  on  their  flight,  nor 
did  they  even  dare  to  think  of  closing  their  eyes 
before  he  should  reach  his  own  home,  fie  knew 
that  he  would  be  pursued  as  long  as  there  was 
the  faintest  hope  of  being  overtaken  and  he  also 
knew  what  his  doom  would  be  if  he  again  fell 
into  the  hands  of  the  Sioux.  Having  remained 
in  the  camp  a  short  time,  the  two  fugitive  lovers 
were  again  on  the  wing    flying   over   the   green 


LAST  OF  THE  POT  rOWA'i' rOMlES 
prairies  of  the  Kankakee  marshes  by  the  light  of 
the  moon.  A  full  and  beautiful  moon  animated 
and  sustained  by  the  purity  of  their  motive,  and 
the  hope  of  soon  reaching  a  place  of  safety  and 
protection.  They  said  they  had  good  horses, 
good  hearts,  good  weather,  good  country  to  tra- 
vel over  and  above  all  a  good  cause  and  why 
not  good  luck.  Kill-buck  learned  afterwards 
that  they  reached  his  home  in  safety  and  lived 
happily  for  many  years.  And  that  was  the  last 
that  was  ever  heard  of  .'Aingo  Doranto.  the  last 
of  the  Pottowattomies.  Lenia  Leota,  his  sister, 
was  taken  captive  by  some  other  hostile  Indians 
and  carried  off  to  the  far  west  toward  the  sunset 
and  her  fate  was  never  known  nor  never  will  be 
until  the  great  day  of  judgment.  But  like  the 
stars  that  shed  their  glory  ore  a  dark  and  trou- 
bled sea,  like  some  long  forgotten  story  cherish- 
ed are  thou  still  to  me.  There  v/ere  two  or  three 
other  Indians  that  lived  and  hunted  and  trapped 
on  the  river.  One  old  Indian,  Sheubana.  lived 
on   French    Island   and   he   was  related  to  old 

120 


PIONEER  HUNTERS  OE  THE  KANKAfCEE 
Peashaway,  who  for  many  years  lived  on  an 
island  in  the  north  marsh  near  the  Cumbcrtand 
lodge.  Sheubana  and  Peashaway  lived  on  the 
head  waters  of  the  Kankaiiee  near  English 
Lake.  When  1  last  heard  of  them,  the  three  In- 
dians mentioned  were  the  last  of  the  Pottowat- 
tomies  on  the  Kankakee. 


CHAPTER  XI 
HOM!{  OF  CHIEF  KILLBUCK 

FRENCH  ISLAND 

FOR  MANY  YEARS  THE  HOME  OF  CHIEFS 

SHEUBANA  AND  OLD  KILLBUCK 

WHEN  SETTLED  BY  A  FRENCH 

FUR  TRADER  NAMED 

LA  BONTA 

The  first  white  man  to  settle  on  French  Island 
was  a  French  fur  trader  by  the  name  of  LaBon- 
ta.  He  settled  here  for  the  purpose  of  trading 
and  trafficing  with  the  early  hunters  and  trap- 
pers who  had  settled  along  the  Kankahee  at 
that  time.  As  1  have  said  before  the  War  De- 
partment granted  a  few  of  the  Fottov/attomies, 
those  who  had  been  friendly  to  the  whites,  per- 
mission to  stay  in  the  KanhaKee  Region,  There 
were  two  or  three  French  families  on  the  island 
who  had  settled  there  years  before  and  for  this 
reason   it   derived    its   name    "French    Island." 

122 


PIONtER  HUNl^ERS  OF  rHt.  KANKAKE?: 
There  were  four  or  five  Indians  living  on  the  is- 
land at  this  time  and  among  them  lived  an  old 
Indian  and  his  aged  squaw  by  the  name  of 
Sheubane.  Me  was  at  the  Pt.  Dearborn  massa- 
cre and  saved  a  great  many  of  the  whites,  lie 
was  over  eighty  years  of  age  when  found  on 
this  island  by  the  white  hunters  in  the  winter  of 
1858  and  of  whom  1  obtained  this  narrative. 
Sheubaria  lived  with  his  squaw  and  two  little 
grandchildren  in  a  wigwam  on  F^rench  Island 
where  LaBonta  found  old  Killbuck  dead  in  the 
winter  of  1857.  "One  day"  said  the  hunter 
"whilst  a  couple  of  us  were  out  hunting  we 
passed  the  wigwam  of  Sheubana  and  found  his 
poor  old  squaw  and  the  children  in  great  distress. 
They  informed  us  that  Sheubana  had  started 
down  the  river  to  hunt  and  been  gone  for  three 
days  and  they  knew  thai  som^ething  had  hap- 
pened him  or  he  would  have  been  bach.  As 
they  were  out  of  m.eat  and  nearly  starved  we 
fed  them  the  best  we  could  and  called  out  ©11 
our  force  and  started  to  hunt  for  him.     We  had 

123 


HOMIi  OF  CHIEF  KILLBUCK 
not  gone  far  when  one  of  the  party  heard  a 
noise  and  §@ing  to  the  spot  found  the  poor  old 
Indian  fast,  with  one  leg  in  one  of  those  traps 
that  were  used  in  those  days.  In  looking  for 
game  in  the  woods  and  brush  he  ran  against 
the  trap  and  sprung  it  and  got  caught  and  being 
old  and  feeble,  could  noi  extract  himself.  And 
there  the  poor  old  soul  had  lain  for  three  days 
and  nights  in  the  cold  and  rain  without  shelter 
or  anything  to  eat,  and  the  storm  and  the  winds 
had  beaten  on  his  aged  head.  V/e  shed  many 
bitter  tears  over  him.  vs/e  extracted  him  as 
soon  as  possible  and  placed  him  on  a  litter 
made  of  sticks  and  barks  and  carried  him  as 
carefully  and  tenderly  as  a  child  to  his  wigwam. 
One  of  the  party  on  returning  had  killed  a  deer 
which  they  carried  along  with  them  and  they 
placed  Sheubana  and  the  deer  at  the  door  of 
the  wigwam  like  Longfellow's  Hiawatha  had 
placed  his  deer  at  the  feet  of  Ainnehaha,  the 
Laughing  Waters.  It  would  have  done  your 
soul  good  (if  you  had  one)  to   have   seen   those 

124 


PIONEfiR  HUNTERS  OF  THE  iCANlvAKEE 
Indians  rejoice  at  the  return  of  Sheubana.  And 
it  was  then  I  could  understand  that  beautiful 
saying  in  the  Bible:  'TheFe  is  greater  rejoicing 
over  one  that  is  lost  and  found,  and  there  is 
more  joy  in  Heaven  over  one  sinner  that  re- 
pents and  is  saved  than  the  ninety  and  nine 
who  went  not  astray.'  Suffice  to  say,  they  took 
as  good  care  of  Sheubana  as  they  could  and 
visited  him  every  day.  We  had  some  iinaments 
and  salves,  sticking  plasters — as  hunters  always 
go  prepared  for  accidents  and  we  applied  them 
freely  and  he  mended  quickly.  But  we  had  to 
leave  and  before  leaving  we  left  them  everything 
we  good  spare  and  plenty  of  game.  I  after- 
wards heard  that  he  got  well,  lived  and  died  on 
the  headv/aters  of  the  Kankakee.  Aay  his  soul 
rest  in  peace."  /Aany  years  ago  this  island  was 
the  hiding  place  of  a  bunch  of  counterfeiters  and 
which  part  of  the  gang  were  captured  at  Bogus 
Island  some  years  ago.  In  the  Fail  of  1859 
Uncle  Marl  Seymour  was  trapping  the  French 
island  ground,  in  the  bayou    between   the    river 

125 


HOMK  OF  CHIEF  KILLBUCK 
and  the  landing,  h'c  was  setting  a  trap  at  an 
old  rat  house  in  the  bayou  when  he  made  a 
discovery.  In  sticking  a  tailey  stake  in  the  old 
rat  house  it  struck  something  hard  and  sounded 
hollow,  like  striking  a  stick  against  an  old  box. 
He  removed  the  top  off  the  rat  house  and  found 
a  small  iron  box  covered  with  rust,  sand  and 
moss,  from  which  rats  used  to  build  their  houses. 
Prom  the  appearance  of  the  box  it  had  been 
hidden  away  in  the  bayou  for  many  years  and 
the  rats  had  built  quite  a  large  house  over  it. 
In  opening  the  box  it  was  found  to  contain  an' 
outfit  of  counterfeiting  tools,  dyes,  plates,  leads 
and  things  that  are  used  In  the  making  of  bogus 
money.  Possibly  this  outfit  belonged  to  part  of 
the  gang  that  was  captured  on  Bogus  Island  in 
the  early  sixties.  There  are  many  dark,  mys- 
terious stories  connected  with  the  early  history 
©f  this  island.  Aany  years  ago  a  man  by  the 
name  of  Beeler  was  hunting  in  the  swamips  and 
his  dogs  ran  a  fox  into  a  hole  on  the  island  and 
in  digging  out  the  den  for  the  fox  he  dug  up  the 

126 


PIONEER  HUNIKRS  OF  THE  KANKAKEE 
remains  of  two  white  men  that  had  been  buried 
for  a  number  of  years  by  unknown  hands  where 
history  docs  not  reach.  in  the  i°all  of  1844  as 
Rens  Brainard  was  hunting  on  the  river  he  dis- 
covered the  body  of  a  man  lodged  against  some 
driftwood  near  the  French  Island  Landing,  tie 
recognized  the  body  as  that  of  John  Drago,  a 
German  who  lived  near  the  island.  Drago  had 
been  murdered  and  two  pieces  of  an  old  iron 
pump  tied  to  his  body  and  then  cast  into  the 
river  to  be  buried  in  the  still  waters  and  peace- 
ful sands,  with  no  marks  of  his  last  resting  place. 
i3ut  the  old  iron  pump  that  was  used  for  a 
weight  was  not  heavy  enough  to  hold  the  body 
down  to  the  sandy  grave  in  which  the  murderer 
had  placed  it.  The  body  srose  and  lodged 
against  some  old  driftwood.  Ar.  Brainard  re- 
ported the  finding  of  the  body  of  a  man  in  the 
Tiver  at  French  Island  to  the  Jasper  County 
authorities  who  came  and  took  up  tlie  body  and 
made  a  postmortem  examination  and  found 
that  he  had   been    murdered.     To   conceal   the 

127 


HOMK  OF  CHIEF  KILLBUCK 
crime,  the  body  had  been  sunken  to  the  body  of 
the  Kanhahee  River.  The  friends  of  the  de- 
ceased soon  went  to  work  to  solve  the  mystery 
and  bring  the  murderer  to  justice.  Strong  sus- 
picion led  to  the  arrest  of  a  Bohemian  named 
V/eberon  Warteno,  who  lived  near  the  island. 
Circumstantial  evidence  was  strong  against  him. 
lie'  finally  confessed  that  he  comm.itied  the 
crime  and  v/as  tried  in  ihe  Circuit  Court,  found 
guilty  and  was  sentenced  to  be  hung.  On  Feb- 
ruary 26,  1886,  in  the  court-yard  at  Rensse- 
laer. Jasper  County,  Indiana,  he  paid  the  pen- 
alty of  the  crime,  thus  ending  the  life  career  of 
Weberon  V/arteno.  ihe  murderer  of  John  Drago. 
About  a  miie  and  a  half  up  the  river  from. 
French  Island  and  on  the  opposite  side  of  the 
river  is  a  big  knob,  too  small  to  be  called  an 
island,  that  has  more  history  to  the  square  foot 
than  any  island  on  the  river.  Having  an  area 
of  about  150  square  feet  and  is  in  a  dense 
swamp  forest  about  150  yards  back  from  the 
river.     It  was  a  hard  place  to  find  for  one   v/ho 

128 


PIONEiLR  HUNTKRS  OK  IHE  KANKAKEP: 
is  not  very  well  acquainted  with  the  location. 
Years  ago  it  was  known  as  Deserters  Island 
from  the  fact  that  during  the  dark  days  of  the 
rebellion  it  was  a  hiding  place  for  deserters  and 
fugitives  from  justice.  Along  in  the  eighteen 
nineties  there  was  organized  at  Hebron,  Indiana 
a  hunting  club  known  as  the  Columbian  Club 
from  the  fact  that  the  Columbian  World's  Pair 
was  going  on  in  Chicago  that  year,  so  they 
called  their  organization  the  Columbian  Hunting 
Club.  There  were  eight  charter  members  of  the 
old  club,  all  business  men  of  Hebron.  <J.  C. 
Smith,  president,  George  Gidley,  secretary  and 
treasurer.  Jerry  Sherwood,  George  A\argison, 
Chas.  Ailler.  Bart  Siglar;  L.E.Ripley  and  Ira 
V.  Fry.  They  built  their  clubhouse  on  the  little 
island  that  I  have  just  described  and  called  it 
Camp  6  to  2,  from  the  fact  that  there  were  six 
democrats  and  two  republicans.  Two  years 
later  the  membership  had  increased  to  sixty-two 
members,  then  the  name  was  changed  to  Island 
Sixty-two  from  the  fact  that   there   were   sixty- 

129 


n 


o 

3 


3 
D- 


o 


c 


c 

3 


HOMK  OF  CHIEF  KILLBUCK 
two  members  in  the  club  and  the  big  knob  or 
island  is  known  by  that  name  to  this  day.  Of 
the  eight  charter  members  of  the  old  Columbian 
Hunting  Club  alf  have  crossed  over  the  divide 
but  three,  Siglar.  Qidley  and  Fry.  The  island 
has  long  since  been  deserted  as  the  swamp  fires 
swept  over  the  island  some  twenty  years  ago 
and  destroyed  the  clubhouse',  yet  now  and  then 
a  camp  was  made  on  the  island  during  the 
duck  shooting  season,  as  shown  in  the  cut.  The 
island  6  to  2  is  pretty  much  like  Goldsmith's 
deserted  village,  forlorn  and  desolate,  yet  there 
are  many  happy  memories  that  cluster  around 
this  little  island  camp  of  hunting  days  in  the 
years  gone  by. 


130 


CHAPTER  XII 
INDIAN  ISLAND 

INDIAN  ISLAND  FIRST  SETTLED 

BY  THE  WHITES.      SOLD  TO  A  SAW  MILL 

COMPANY    WHERE   THE  FIRST   STEAMBOAT 

WAS  BUILT  ON  THE  KANKAKEE 

Indian  Island  in  an  early  day  was  known  as 
Aike's  Island  from  the  fact  that  there  was  a 
white  man  by  the  name  of  A\ike  Maskins  who 
hunted  with  the  Indians  and  camped  on  this 
island  and  whom  I  mentioned  before,  it  was 
better  known  as  Indian  Island  and  was  for  un- 
told ages  the  hunting  and  camping  grounds  of 
the  Pottowattomie  Indians.  It  is  one  of  the  old- 
est inhabited  islands  on  the  Kankakee  and 
there  was  no  Indian  camp  betv/een  the  head- 
waters and  the  mouth  of  this  historical  river 
that  had  a  better  fortification  than  Indian  Island, 

131 


INDIAN  ISLAND 
Haskins  Wds  with  General  Harrison  on  that  fa- 
mous march  up  the  Wabash  and  Tippecanoe 
Rivers  and  it  was  this  white  hunter  who  fired  the 
first  shot  .at  the  Battle  of  Tippecanoe.  On  a 
misty,  moonlight  night  in  November,  1811,  Mas- 
kins  was  on  picket  duty  and  as  the  Indians 
made  theis  attack  on  the  camp  in  the  night  by 
crav/ling  upon  the  sleeping  army.  in  the  early 
part  of  the  night  it  had  been  raining  but  along 
about  midnight  it  broke  away  and  the  clouds 
v/ere  thin  and  scattering.  There  was  a  full 
moon  and  as  the  clouds  were  light  they  moved 
very  rapidly  and  at  times  the  moon  shown  in  its 
full  brightness.  As  the  Indians  had  just  been 
supplied  v/ith  new  guns  and  hatchets  they  were 
still  very  bright.  The  Indians  made  their  attack 
about  three  o'clock  in  the  morning  and  as  they 
skulked  and  crawled  upon  the  cam.p  Maskins 
sav/  something  glisten  as  the  m.oon  shone 
through  the  thin  clouds  and  knev/  what  it  was. 
.He  pulled  his  gun  to  his  shoulder,  took  aim  at 
the  glistening  ©bjcct,  pulled  the  trigger,    and    an 

132 


PIONEER  HUNTERS  OF  i'HE  KANKAKEE 
Indian  bounded  up  out  ©f  the  grass  and  yelled. 
This  aroused  the  others  and  the  battle  began 
and  the  result  of  that  shot  is  well  known.  The 
reader  remembers  i  told  in  a  previous 
chapter  what  brought  liaskins  to  the  Kankakee 
Swamps.  In  1854  Aaron  Broady  Sr.,  and  his 
son,  John,  entered  the  land.  The  land  of  which 
the  island  was  originally  a  part  belonged  to  the 
State  and  contains  one  hundred  and  twenty 
acres.  The  island  itself  only  contains  about 
thirty-five  or  forty  acres.  In  the  early  days  be-- 
fore  the  country  was  drained  it  was  surrounded 
by  water  nearly  the  whole  year  round  and  the 
only  way  of  getting  to  the  island  was  with  boat 
or  by  wading  in  from  the  north  side.  In  the  dry 
season  when  the  water  v^as  low  you  could  drive 
in  with  a  team  but  in  the  winter  season  when 
the  marshes  were  frozen  up,  getting  in  on  the 
ice  was  the  best  time.  The  Broadies  each  built 
a  log  cabin  and  cleared  up  afeout  ten  acres  and 
put  it  under  cultivation.  The  island  at  that  time 
was  heavily  timbered.      The  Kankakee  swamps 

133 


INDIAN  ISLAND 
were  originally  covered  with  a  heavy  timber, 
hard  wood.  On  the  dry  land  v/as  found  many 
varieties  of  oak  and  hickory,  while  on  the  bot- 
tom or  swamps  which  were  covered  with  water 
is  the  white  and  black  ssh,  red  and  white  beech 
sycamore,  elm,  soft  maple,  white  coUonwood, 
white  and  yellow  birch,  and  three  or  four  veri- 
ties of  swamp  or  water  oak,  whilst  on  the  ridges 
is  found  the  white  and  black  walnut,  three  spe- 
cies of  dry  land  oak,  sassrjfras.  paw-paws,  waw- 
hoe,  prickley  ash,  red  haws,  iron  wood  and  dog 
wood.  Aost  of  this  timber  was  valuable  saw 
timber  and  on  this  island  was  a  good  site  for  a 
saw  mill.  So  in  1866  a  company  was  organ- 
ized and  known  as  the  Indian  island  Sawmill 
Company.  It  was  made  up  of  prairie  farmers 
who  owned  swamp  lands.  They  bought  the 
island  from  the  Broadies.  paying  them  five 
thousand  dollars  in  cash  for  it  and  in  the  win- 
ter of  '66  when  the  marsh  was  frozen  up  they 
put  the  sawmill  on  the  island  and  soon  had  it  in 
operation.     Pirst   they   sawed   the     lum.ber    to 

134 


PlONtSR  HUNTERS  OF  TH  K  KANKAfCEE 
build  the  mill  and  to  put  up  a  house  for  the  mill 
boss  and  his  men  to  live  in.  The  house  was 
built  of  white  oak  throughout  except  the  floor 
and  that-  was  of  white  ash.  The  building  is  six- 
teen by  thirty-four  feet,  one  story,  and  is  box 
sided  with  one  by  twelve  inch  white  oak  siding. 
The  house  his  never  been  painted  and  is  in 
good  condition  and  in  use  at  this  writing.  1920. 
Several  years  ago  there  was  a  lean-to  built  on 
the  east  side  of  the  house  and  in  this  building  is 
where  1  spent  ten  years  of  my  boyhood  days. 
The  mill  business  was  good.  In  the  winter 
Vv'hen  the  swamps  were  frozen  up  thousands  of 
logs  were  brought  to  the  mill  and  sawed  into 
lumber.  But  getting  the  lumber  off  the  island, 
was  somewhat  of  a  task  as  there  were  only  cer- 
tain times  of  the  year  that  it  could  be  hauled 
out  to  the  dry  land.  In  1868  John  Bissell  and 
Ira  Cornell,  two  of  the  heaviest  stockholders  in 
the  I.  I.  5.  A.  Company,  built  and  put  on  the 
river  a  steamer.  The  White  Star,  for  the  purposr 
of  transporting  lumber  and  cord  wood    down    io 

135 


INDIAN  ISLAND 
/Aomcnce,  Illinois,  and  other  points  along  the 
river  where  there  was  sale  for  their  product.  The 
island  is  about  one  hundred  rods  from  the  river 
and  in  order  to  get  the  steamer  and  flat  boats 
from  the  island  to  the  river  they  had  to  dig  a 
canal  eighteen  feet  wide  and  four  feet  deep. 
Pether  was  put  on  the  job  as  superintendent  and 
with  3  gang  of  men  with  shovels  dug  what  was 
Known  then  and  is  to  this  day  as  the  Bissell- 
Cornell  steamboat  canal.  Adison  E.  Buck,  of 
Hecron,  Indiana,  was  the  master  boat  builder. 
For  several  trips  up  and  down  the  river  Pather 
was  the  pilot  and  John  Bissel,  captain.  The 
freighting  business  on  the  KanHakeedid  not  pan 
out  just  as  expected  and  in  the  early  seventies 
the  steamer  and  flat  boats  or  .scowes,  as  they 
were  called,  were  sold  to  a  Aomence  party  and 
fitted  out  for  a  pleasure  boat.  In  '71  Pather 
bought  the  Bissel  stock  in  the  I.  I.  5.  A'\.  Com- 
pany which  contained  two-fifths  of  the  shares  in 
the  company.  The  reader  remembers  that  it 
was  here  where  I  left  them  in  the  opening  chap- 

136 


PIONEER  HUNTERS  OF  THE  KANKAKEE 
tcr  of  this  story  and  it  is  only  rigiit  and  proper 
that  I  take  them  with  me  to  my  island  home  on 
}he  Kankakee.  It  was  way  back  in  the  hazy 
and  smok@y  old  days  of  October,  in  1871,  those 
days  that  now  seem  to  belong  to  another  cen- 
tury and  another  manner  of  living,  These  were 
the  days  you  could  hardly  see  the  sun  on  ac- 
count of  the  dense  clouds  of  smoke  that  would 
settle  over  the  lowlands  and  thousands  of  acres 
of  Kankakee  marshes  and  swamps  were  on  fire 
not  only  here  but  thousands  of  acres  elsewhere 
were  burning  and  not  only  the  prairie,  marshes 
and  forests,  but  cities  and  towns  were  passing 
away  in  smoke.  The  year '71  was  known  as 
the  dry  season.  The  river  was  very  low,  the 
lowest  it  had  been  for  years.  The  swamps  and 
marshes  in  many  places  had  dried  out  and  the 
filling  of  sell-moved  earth  of  past  centuries  that 
had  washed  in  from  the  highlands,  sediments 
and  decayed  vegitation.  This  took  fire  and 
burned  everything  down  to  the  sub-soil.  Thous- 
ands of  acres  of  marsh  land  were    burned  out  in 

137 


H 
(I 


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o 

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cr 

o 

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;^ 

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rt> 


'    >  -t   '      ',   * 


INDIAN  ISLAND 
this  way,  leaving  deep  holes  covering  an  area  of 
two  to  twenty  acres  in  a  place  and  from  one  to 
five  feet  in  depth  and  when  filled  with  water 
made  many  small  lakes  and  ponds.  The  day 
we  moved  to  the  island,  October  9,  was  the  hot 
day  in  Chicago,  the  great  Chicago  fire.  It  was 
on  this  island  that  many  scenes  of  my  boyhood 
experiences  were  painted  on  memery's  canvas, 
as  it  was  here  that  1  began  my  early  experiences 
hunting  with  a  shot  gun.  During  the  early 
seventies  and  eighties  this  island  v/as  a  great 
camping  ground  for  hunters  coming  from  far  and 
near.  I  have  met  with  hunters  from  all  parts  of 
the  country  who  came  here  to  shoot  wild  geese 
and  duchs.  In  the  Fall  of  '75,  li.  J.  AcSheehy, 
of  Logansport,  Indiana,  made  his  first  hunting 
trip  to  this  island  and  the  acquaintance  of  this 
newspaper  mian  grew  into  inseperable  friend- 
ship. It  was  A\i.  AcSheehy  and  his  party  that 
brought  the  first  breech-loaders  to  the  island  and 
the  next  year  his  hunting  partner,  the  late  John 
Condon,  a  millionaire  rece-trecU  man  of  Chica- 


PIONEER  KUNTKRS  OF  THE  KANKAKEE 
go,  brought  to  our  place  the  first  air  pillows  that 
1  ever  sav/.  It  was  in  a  hunting  boat  on  the 
Kankakee  marshes  and  near  our  place  that  1 
first  met  one  of  Indiana's  most  famous  writers, 
General  Lew  Wallace.  He  was  with  a  party  of 
Indianapolis  hunters  and  was  stopping  at  the 
Indianapolis.  Terre  Haute  and  Rockville  club 
houses  at  Baum's  Bridge,  I  might  mention 
scores  of  Indiana  hunters  who  have  at  some 
time  in  the  years  past  hunted  on  the  Kankakee. 
Getting  logs  out  of  the  swamp  was  very  un- 
certain owing  to  various  conditions  of  the 
swamps.  Sometimes  the  swamp  would  freeze 
up  early  in  the  winter  with  high  water  and  be- 
fore it  froze  solid  the  water  would  leave  the  ice 
making  it  shelly  and  when  the  ice  was  in  this 
condition  it  was  dangerous  getting  around  v/ith 
a  team.     Under  these   conditions   logging   was 

• 

no  good  that  winter.  Finally  Father  sold  the 
saw  mill  to  some  parties  in  Valparaiso  and  they 
moved  it  to  the  big  v/oods  near  Chesterlcn,  In- 
diana.    About  25  years   ago    Father   sold   the 

139 


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INDIAN  ISLAND 
island  to  /Ar.  Henry  Kahler,  of  Chicago,  who 
fitted  up  the  place  for  a  hunting  and  fishing  re- 
sort. In  1908  a  party  of  Chicago  sportsmen  or- 
ganized what  was  known  as  tlie  Kankakee  Val- 
ley Hunting  Club  with  Frank  Nahser,  president. 
Dr.  p.  A.  Hoffman,  vice-president,  and  Henry 
Stevens,  secretary  and  treasurer.  The  club 
leased  the  hunting  rights  on  several  thousand 
acres  of  sv/amp  land  and  built  their  clubhouse 
on  Indian  Island,  where  some  of  the  members 
of  the  club  made  hunting  trips  to  this  place 
every  year  until  the  swamps  were  drained  and 
duck  shooting  became  a  thing  of  the  past.  Then 
they  sold  the  club  house  and  it  was  taken  down 
and  moved  away. 


140 


CHAPTER  XIII 

GRAPE  ISLAND 

TRAGEDY  ON  GRAPE  ISLAND. 

A  TYPE  OF  TRAPS  THAT  WERE  USED 

BY  THE  PIONEER    HUNTERS   FOR   CATCHING 

WILD  GAME  BEFORE  STEEL  TRAPS 

WERE  INVENTED. 

The  history  of  Grape  Island  is  a  history  with  a 
dark  page  in  it.  Grape  Island,  as  well  as  many 
other  swamp  islands,  never  made  any  perma- 
nent settlement  but  it  was  inhabited  by  hunters 
and  trappers  during  the  hunting  season.  The  . 
island  was  first  inhabited  by  white  men  as  early 
as  1844  by  a  man  named  Allen  Dutcher;  who 
built  a  shanty  and  hunted  wild  game  and  caught 
the  fur  bearing  animals  in  rude  traps.  A  few 
years  later  he  used  steel  traps,  f^any  other  old 
time  hunters  have  made  this  island  their  tem- 
porary home  during  the  trapping  season.       The 

141 


GRAPE  ISLAND 
tragedy  on  Grape  Island  put  a  dark  page  in  its 
history,  as  there  was  one  of  the  most  cold-blood- 
ed murders  committed  on  this  island  that  was 
ever  knov/n  in  the  history  of  the  Kankakee 
Swamps.  Early  in  the  fall  of  1876  John  France 
and  James  Cotton,  two  trappers,  had  bought  or 
traded  for  the  Grape  Island  trapping  ground. 
They  built  a  log  cabin,  using  green  cottonwood 
logs  and  they  covered  it  with  a  board  roof.  Prior 
to  this,  for  many  years  they  had  been  trapping 
the  soi:th  marsh  below  Long  Ridge.  Their  grub 
box  was  getting  low,  so  l'\r.  France  went  to 
Hebron,  Indiana,  to  get  grub-supplies  and  he 
stayed  at  Hebron  over  night.  The  next  day  he 
returned  to  the  island  and  found  the  cabin  burn- 
ed. The  roof  and  part  of  one  side  and  end  was 
burned.  On  investigation  he  found  everything 
inside  burned  and  among  the  ruins  he  found  the 
charred  body  of  his  partner.  There  was  found  a 
bullet  hole  in  his  skull,  indicating  that  he  had 
been  murdered  and  the  cabin  set  on  fire  to  cover 
up  the  crime  and  destroy  all  trace  of  evidence. 

142 


PIONEER  HUNTERS  OF  THE  KANKAKEE 
And  as  I  said,  the  logs  were  green,  therefor  the 
cabin  did  not  completely  burn  down.  The  pur- 
porter  of  this  dastardly  crime  was  never  appre- 
hended. /Aany  theories  were  advanced  for  the 
motive  of  the  crime  but  no  facts,  and  it  was  the 
general  supposition  that  he  was  murdered  for  to 
obtain  his  money,  as  they  had  recently  sold  their 
furs.  They  had  chosen  this  particular  time  while 
one  was  absent  from  camp.  Now  1  will  tell  you 
how  the  Indians  and  old  pioneer  trappers  made 
^their  rude  traps  in  early  times.  They  would  take 
a  small  log,  eight  or  ten  inches  in  diameter,  and 
fifteen  or  eighteen  feet  long  and  split  it  about  ha  if 
or  two-thirds  of  the  way.  Place  the  log  on  the 
run-way  on  the  banks  of  a  creek  or  river  or 
wherever  game  is  likely  to  pass  and  then  take 
another  small  log  or  heavy  stick  for  weight  and 
it  on  top  of  the  split  pole  and  then  about  two 
feet  from  the  end  where  the  game  is  to  be 
caught.  Drive  dov/n  two  stakes,  one  on  each 
side  of  the  pole  to  keep  it  in  place,  and  two 
m.ore  at  the  other  end  the   same    way,    and    for 

143 


1,- 


r«)r^^ 


Ruins  of  a  Trapper's  Cabin  on  Grape  Island  where 
James  Cotton  was  murdered  and  burned 
February  7,  1877 


CJRAPE  ISLAND 
the  same  purpose.  They  then  made  a  common 
stick  trigger  out  of  v/ood  like  you  use  to  set 
quail  traps,  only  much  larger,  called  a  figure  4. 
Then  raise  up  the  end  of  the  split  stick  the  ne- 
cessary heighth.  set  the  trigger  and  place  the 
bait  on  the  long  stick  and  woe  unto  the  wolf. 
fox,  wild-cat.  coon,  mink  or  any  other  animal 
that  takes  hold  of  the  bait  or  touches  the  trig- 
ger, for  that  springs  the  trap  and  down  comes 
the  upper  sticks  on  the  lower  stick  which  is 
kept  in  place  by  the  stakes  en  each  side  and 
catches  the  victims  between  them.  That  rude 
trap  was  rightly  named  when  it  was  called  a 
"Dead  Fail"  for  in  the  morning  you  will  find  your 
game  dead  without  the  use  of  a  club.  We  gen- 
erally find  no  cause  of  blame  or  negligence  on 
the  part  of  the  trap,  but  generaliy  find  the  victim 
was  either  deaf,  dumb  or  blind,  and  no  cause  to 
run  in  the  way  of  a  trap.  We  exonerate  all  that 
is  attached  to  the  traps  from  our  blame  for  their 
sad  misfortune.  Another  mde  trap  that  was 
used  for  catching  wild  game  without  the    use  of 

144 


PiONKER  HUNTERS  OF  THE  KANKAKEE 
spring  or  trigger  in  those  early  times  was  to  cijt 
a  hole  in  a  hollow  tree  about  fifteen  inches  from 
the  ground  large  enough  for  a  lynx,  wolf,  fox  ;jr 
wild-cat  to  put  his  head  in.  Cut  a  crevice  ten 
or  twelve  inches  long  below  sloping  almost  to  a 
point  at  the  bottom,  then  hang  your  bait  in  the 
hollow  the  hole  and  wait  for  the  results.  /Ar. 
Lynx,  wolf,  fox  or  wild-cat  comes  along,  puis 
his  head  in  the  hollow  for  the  bait  and  as  he 
comes  down  to  get  the  bait  his  head  and  necH 
comes  down  the  crevice.  In  the  morning  yo  i 
will  find  your  game  dead  without  the  benefit  <:-4 
clergy.  Another  was  the  snare  trap,  or  swing- 
ing trap,  as  they  were  sometimes  called,  were 
among  the  first  used  on  the  Kankakee  in  early 
times.  They  would  take  a  sapling  and  bend  t 
so  as  the  top  would  reach  the  ground  and  :-! 
was  held  in  that  position  by  means  of  one  stick 
trigger.  A  stake  was  driven  in  the  ground  and 
squared  on  two  sides.  One  side  of  the  slick 
had  a  notch  cut  in  so  as  to  fit  on  the  square 
side  of  the  stake,  the  other  end  was    fastened  to 

145 


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4-1 

c 


G 

o 


PIONHKR  HUNTIiRS  OK  THF.  KANKAKEK 
the  sapling  by  a  hook  notch.  The  bait  was  fast 
to  the  trigger  so  it  could  not  be  moved  without 
pullinc  the  stick  out  of  the  notch  in  the  stake. 
To  the  sapling  they  would  fix  their  snares  made 
of  buck-skin  strings,  such  as  was  used  in  those 
days.  Then  they  would  make  quite  a  number 
of  loops  and  place  them  all  around  the  bait,  so 
as  the  game  could  not  get  the  bait  without  put- 
ting its  head  through  one  or  more  of  the  snares; 
and  woe  unto  the  wolf  or  any  other  animal  that 
touches  the  bait,  for  that  pulls  the  stick  out  of 
the  notch  in  the  stake  that  holds  the  sapling  and 
v/hen  you  return  you  will  find  your  game  swing- 
ing in  the  air  several  feet  above  the  ground  as 
shown  in  illustration.  One  more  of  these  fa- 
mous old-time  game  catchers  that  was  used  on 
the  Kankakee  long  before  steel  traps  were  in 
use  or  even  thought  of  were  what  they  called  a 
game-pen.  It  was  built  of  logs-- top,  sides  and 
bottom.  It  was  built  in  a  side  hill  or  bluff,  up  to 
the  level  of  the  ground.  Then  they  had  a  trap 
door  on  top.     The  top  of  the   pen   was   covered 

146 


PlONhhH  HUNTI.RSOI''  IHK  KANKAKhh 
with  leaves  or  grass  to  hide  suspicion  and  over 
the  door  ihey  hung  up  the  bait,  usually  a  piece 
of  venison,  When  a  hungry  woli.  lynx  or  fox 
came  along  they  would  stop  to  feed  on  the  bait 
and  they  would  have  to  pass  over  the  trap  door. 
When  they  were  about  to  take  hold  of  the  veni- 
son the  game  would  step  upon  the  door,  It 
would  turn  and  down  they  went  into  the  pen.  in 
early  times  when  there  was  plenty  of  such  game 
along  the  Kankakee  swamps  it  was  not  an  un- 
common thing  to  take  three  or  i(jur  wolves  out 
of  the  pen  at  one  time  and  sometimes  a  mixed 
lot  of  game  is  caught,  such  as  wolves,  foxes  and 
wild-cats.  /Aany  years  ago  some  trappers  had 
a  trap  of  this  kind  on  a  little  island  in  the  North 
/Aarsh  and  they  took  out  of  the  pen  at  one  time 
two  wolves,  three  foxes  and  a  wild-cat.  in  an 
early  day  it  was  said  that  a  few  panthers  v/ere 
caught  in  this  v/ay  on  the  uplands,  as  the  pan- 
ther did  not  inhabit  the  swamps  on  account  of 
the  water,  as  they  were  not  much  for  water. 
But  a  number  were  caught  in  the  big  v/oods  near 

147 


GRAPE  ISLAND 
Lake  /Michigan.  V/hen  the  steel  traps  came  in 
use  the  old  rude  traps  were  almost  forgotten  and 
are  remembered  as  a  thing  of  the  past.  About 
thirty-seven  years  ago  I  built  and  used  a  pen 
trap  on  the  foot-hills  of  the  Rochies  to  catch 
mountain  lion  and  bear.  I  also  built  and  used 
a  dead-fall  on  the  KanxHahee  to  catch  a  red  fox 
that  was  so  cunning  1  could  not  catch  it  with  a 
steel  trap.  All  old  trappers  know  that  a  fox  is 
the  most  cunning  animal  in  the  world  to  catch 
in  a  steel  trap.  1  will  tell  you  how  v/e  used  to 
catch  wild  turkeys  in  a  trap.  We  would  build  a 
pen  out  of  poles  eight  or  ten  feet  square  and 
two  feet  high,  and  cover  it  with  poles  and  brush. 
But  before  building  the  pen  begin  about  ten  feet 
from  one  side  and  dig  a  trench,  tapering  it  under 
the  edge  of  the  pen  just  deep  enough  for  the  tur- 
key to  get  in  by  stooping  down.  You  continue 
the  trench  on  inside  of  the  pen  a  couple  of  feet 
until  the  trench  is  not  more  than  six  or  eight 
inches  deep  at  the  end.  You  then  scatter  corn 
in  the  trench  to  the  end  and  around  in  the   pen. 

148 


GRAPE  ISLAND 
The  turkeys  come  along  and  see  the  corn.  They 
start  in  the  trench,  eating  as  they  go  along, 
and  stooping  under  the  edge  of  the  pen  and 
jumping  up  on  the  high  part  for  the  corn  and 
there  they  are.  The  poor  simple  things  never 
think  of  jumping  down  and  passing  out  again  as 
they  came  in.  There  you  have  them.  1  must 
say  that  I  never  could  see  much  providence, 
sense  or  instinct  in  this  matter  and  it  is  a  worse 
case  than  any  of  the  traps  in  the  business  that  I 
know  of. 


149 


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> 
«2 


CHAPTER  XIV 
BARRiX-HOUSE  BLIND 

SHOOTING 

DUCKS  FROM  A 

BARRELHOUSE  BLIND.        THE 

FIRST  TUB  SHOOTING  ON 

THE  KANKAKEE 

MARSHES. 

Of  course  you  remember  where  the  last  chap- 
ter ended.  /'Rethinks  I  hear  some  old-time 
hunter  say;  "You  bet  I  do."  These  reminis- 
cences of  deer  hunts  related  left  enough  old 
time  recollections  to  keep  me  from  forgetting  a's 
long  as  1  live  where  the  last  chapter  ended.  It 
happened  during  the  winter  hunt  of  seventy-four 
and  the  story  of  what  transpired  and  some  other 
experiences  have  been  told  in  trappers'  shanties 
and  in  hunters'  lodges.  As  1  have  promised  at 
some  time  to  tell  you  how  we  shot  geese  and 
ducks  on  the  open  marshes,  so  here  goes.     /Ay 

i50 


BARRliL-HOUSE  BLIND 
first  duck  shooting  trip  to  the  South  /Aarshcs 
was  made  in  October,  1872.  As  a  boy  of 
twelve  years  1  had  done  a  little  shooting  in  the 
ponds  and  on  fly-ways  at  our  island  home  but 
never  had  been  out  on  a  big  hurt  like  this  be- 
fore, as  1  termed  it  when  any  mention  was  made 
of  this  trip,  1  found  the  hunting  entirely  differ- 
ent on  the  big,  open  marsh  than  what  I  was 
used  to  around  the  island.  Ducks  were  not 
very  plentiful  on  the  marsh  that  fall  so  .my  first 
hunting  trip  was  of  short  duration.  A  year  or  so 
after  this  I  was  sitting  in  a  trapper's  shanty  be- 
hind a  stove,  it  was  a  cold  winter  night,  listening 
to  hunters'  yarns  and  stories,  told  by  a  party  of 
deer  hunters  who  were  in  camp  on  the  island. 
They  were  spinning  hunters'  yarns  and  discuss- 
ing the  excellent  hunting  conditions  of  the  Kan- 
kakee region,  as  two  members  of  the  party  were 
old-time  hunters  of  the  swamps  for  many  years. 
While  the  old  story-teller  had  stopped  to  get  his 
wind.  Bill  Jones,  a  marked  hunter,  turned  to  me 
with  the  question:  "liow  would  you  enjoy  a  duck 

151 


IMONM.R  HUNTKRS  ()K  IHK  KANKAKLh. 
hunt  on  Wolf  Lake  just  as  soon  as  the  ice  goes 
out?"  In  less  than  ten  minutes  the  trip  was  all 
arranged  and  the  start  was  to  be  made  as  soon 
.  as  the  ice  was  out  of  the  marshes.  V/olf  Lake 
was  noted  for  its  early  duck  shooting  on  account 
tliat  the  ice  goes  out  sooner  than  it  does  on  the 
shallow  v/ater  marsh,  as  the  winter  snows  and 
soft  winds  will  soon  melt  it  out  long  before  it 
does  on  the  shallow  water  where  there  is  more 
grass  and  willows  frozen  in  the  ice  that  holds  it 
down  under  the  water  so  that  the  sun  and  winds 
never  touch  it.  It  is  a  long  time  going  out. 
These  marshes  have  attracted  the  attention  of 
sportsmen  from  all  parts  of  the  country  who 
would  pilgrimage  to  this  region  year  after  year 
to  shoot  geese  and  ducks,  It  was  very  seldom 
that  a  mistake  was  made  by  coming  to  this 
place  for  successful  duck  shooting.  The  hunters 
pulled  down  their  birds  with  distressing  regular- 
ity, although  it  is  practically  prairie  shooting 
which  is  so  deceiving  to  the  novice.  From  this 
fact  that  in  later  years  the  shooting  is  done  from 

152 


PIONELR  HUN'rKRSOF  THE  KANKAKhfc. 
a  portable  blind  called  a  sink-tub  and  which  is 
commonly  called  tub-shooting  rather  than  from 
a  boat  or  a  blind.  In  the  fall  shooting  there  is 
plenty  of  grass,  flags  and  marsh  willows  growing 
in  the  shallow  water  marshes  for  a  blind  but 
when  the  marshes  froze  over  the  grass  is  set  on 
fire  by  hunters  to  drive  trie  game  out  and  after 
the  fire  has  run  over  the  ice  covered  marshes 
everything  is  burned  off  slick  and  clean  above 
the  ice  so  in  the  Spring  shooting  there  is  nothing 
for  a  blind.  As  the  days  of  the  long,  cold  winter 
were  passing  and  the  clear,  sunny  days  of 
Springtime  had  come  and  melted  the  ice  out  oi 
the  marsh  I  began  to  get  restless,  more  so  as  the 
days  lengthened  into  Spring.  I  knew  well  it  was 
the  call  of  the  wild,  as  it  gets  hold  of  me  about 
every  Spring  and  Fall  and  when  I  was  a  boy  it 
got  me  oftener  than  that.  Finally  I  hit  upon  the 
absolutely  right  thing  in  my  estimation;  a  practi- 
cal, sensible  sink  tub.  It  consists  of  a  kerosene 
barrel  by  sawing  the  top  of  the  barrel  off  at  the 
bulge.     Then  I  went  to  a  blacksmith   shop  and 

153 


barri'X-housp:  blind 

had  two  rings  made  and  bolted  to  the  barrel  for 
stake  rings  and  with  two  stakes  four  or  five  feet 
long  with  hooks  on  driven  in  the  ground  and 
then  hooked  into  the  rings  on  the  barrel  to  hold 
it  down,  just  leaving  the  top  of  the  barrel  high 
enough  above  the  surface  so  that  the  water 
could  not  splash  over,  in  case  the  water  was 
shallow  a  hole  was  dug  to  lower  the  tub  to  the 
water  level.  If  the  water  was  not  too  deep  the 
hunter  would  wade  out  to  his  blind,  otherwise  he 
would  be  rowed  out  in  a  boat.  In  shooting  from 
a  sink  tub  blind  one  has  to  shoot  over  decoys 
and  a  hunter  with  a  good  call  and  a  bunch  of 
decoys  was  pretty  sure  of  a  string  of  birds  to 
take  to  camp.  3y  the  time  the  ice  was  out  of 
the  marsh  I  had  everything  ready  for  the  start. 
The  ice  usually  goes  out  about  the  tenth  to  the 
twentieth  of  /Aarch.  Sometimes  it  is  earlier 
than  that  and  sometimes  later,  finally  the  day 
for  the  start  came.  We  made  camp  on  a  small 
island  in  the  marsh  near  a  large  island  called 
Round  Grove  and  near  a    large,    open    body   of 

154 


PIONELK  HUNTERS  OF  THE  KANKAKEE 
water  called  Goose  Pond,  which  bordered  on  the 
swamp  timber  line.  After  supper  1  set  my  bar- 
rel house  blind  and  had  all  made  ready  for  the 
morrow.  I  lay  down  on  a  marsh  hay  bed  to 
dream  of  the  long  line  of  quacking  ducks  com- 
ing to  the  decoys.  I  was  up  early  the  following 
morning.  Placing  a  dozen  wood  decoys  in  a 
basket  with  my  powder  flask  and  shot  pouch 
and  with  my  No.  10  double  barrel  muzzle  loader 
on  my  shoulder  1  departed  for  the  blind  which  I 
reached  before  sunrise.  In  going  through  the 
marsh  to  the  blind  I  ran  across  the  remains  of 
an  old  blind  that  had  been  used  the  year  before 
with  a  stake  driven  in  the  ground  and  a  half  cir- 
cle board.  Part  of  the  head  of  a  nail  keg  was 
nailed  on  the  stake  still  standing.  With  my 
hatchet  1  cut  the  stake  off  at  the  water's  edge 
and  put  it  in  my  barrel  house  blind,  It  fitted 
nicely  and  made  a  good  seat.  1  placed  the  de- 
coys about  twenty  yards  in  front  of  the  blind. 
Stepping  inside  the  barrel  I  picked  up  my  old 
fowling  piece,  placing  caps  on  the  tubs,  snapped 

155 


iBARRlt:L-HOUSE  BLIND 
them  to  make  sure  that  the  tubs  were  clean  and 
dry.  1  always  did  this  before  loading  a  gun  that 
had  not  been  used  for  sometime.  Then  care- 
fully loading  with  four  drams  of  powder  and  one 
and  one-eighth  ounce  of  No.  6  shot  I  was  set 
for  whatever  came  along.  As  the  sun  arose 
ibove  the  timber  of  the  swamp  and  over  the 
marsh  horizon  like  a  big  ball  of  brass,  the  spike- 
tails  and  wegians  began  to  fly  in  countless  num- 
bers. A  few  shots  had  been  fired  on  the  marsh 
a  mile  or  so  above  where  I  was  by  some  camp- 
ers on  Round  Grove.  This  put  the  ducks  to 
flight.  It  was  quite  interesting  to  watch  these 
movements  among  the  thousands  of  spikes  and 
wegians.  I  heard  the  quack  of  two  green- 
heads.  It  took  me  some  time  to  locate  them 
among  the  spike-tails  and  wegians.  But  an- 
swering my  call  they  decoyed  nicely  and  as  they 
poised  in  the  air  before  alighting  they  made  an 
easy  mark  and  they  both  came  tumbling  down 
at  the  first  shot.  Shortly  after  this  a  flock  of 
canvas-backs   came  over   the  decoys,   leaving 

156 


PlONEhR  HUNTERS  OF  THE  KANKAKEE 
three  of  their  number  behind.  1  did  fairly  well 
after  my  return  to  the  blind  on  the  second  morn- 
ing, for  1  had  a  double  shot  at  a  bunch  of  pin- 
tails. Then  while  my  gun  was  empty  there 
came  to  the  decoys  the  largest  flock  of  black 
ducks  I  ever  saw.  Without  exageration  1  believe 
there  was  over  a  hundred  of  them.  They  lit 
among  the  decoys  and  all  around  my  sneak 
barrel,  some  within  twenty  feet  of  where  I  sat 
with  an  empty  gun.  Imagine,  if  you  can,  how 
queer  1  felt  while  sitting  there  like  a  bump  on  a 
log.  Those  that  lit  close  by  eyed  me  anxiously. 
Finally  1  began  very  carefully  to  load  the  gun. 
I  got  the  powder  in  all  right  but  did  not  have 
room  enough  in  the  barrel  to  get  the  ramrod  out 
and  get  the  wads  down  on  the  powder  without 
exposing  my  arms  above  the  barrel.  Those 
near  me  gave  the  warning  signal  and  took 
flight.  In  a  moment  all  were  gone.  1  finished 
loading  but  never  fully  recovered  over  my  mis- 
hap of  losing  the  best  chance  I  have  ever  had 
in  ^11  my  hunting  experiences  for  a  big   shot   at 

157 


BARRliL-HOUSE  BLIND 
black  ducks,  Shortly  after  this  a  large  lone 
duck  came  from  the  direction  of  the  swamp 
timber  and  came  over  in  the  decoys  and  as  he 
poised  and  curved  his  wings  to  light  I  let  him 
down  with  the  first  barral  and  when  I  waded  out 
to  pick  him  up  I  found  a  duck  unknown  to  me. 
It  was  a  large  brown  bird  with  a  large  flat  bill, 
looking  very  much  like  a  spoon-bill.  None  of 
the  hunters  on  the  marsh  that  saw  it  could  tell 
the  name  of  the  duck.  The  morning  of  the 
third  day  was  rough  and  cold,  the  wind  was 
blowing  strong  from  the  northwest  and  not  many 
ducks  were  seen  out  on  the  open  marsh  in 
stormy  and  windy  weather  for  they  would  stay 
in  or  near  the  timber.  Yet  I  had  fairly  good 
shooting  for  two  or  three  hours  in  the  morning. 
As  I  was  sitting  in  my  sink  barrel  blind  thinking 
how  much  more  comfortable  it  was  than  stand- 
ing in  the  water  in  a  grass  blind  all  day,  I  heard 
a  loud  "swish"  of  wings.  Looking  out  I  saw  five 
large  ducks  over  the  decoys.  1  arose,  gave 
them  the  right  barrel  and  two   fell   dead   and  a 

158 


PlONKhR  HUNTERS  OF  I'HE  KANKAKKh 
clean  miss  with  the  second.  1  waded  out  and 
piclied  up  two  black  ducks  and  here  is  where  I 
discovered  that  there  are  two  varieties  of  black 
ducks  just  as  surely  as  two  and  two  make  four. 
By  ten  o'clock  it  was  getting  very  rough.  The 
waves  would  splash  over  the  top  of  the  barrel. 
I  gathered  up  my  decoys  and  made  a  bee-line 
for  camp.  1  had  in  all  forty-six  ducks  and  in 
that  number  there  were  eight  varieties  of  the 
duck  family.  /Aany  of  the  varieties  that  1  killed 
then  are  now  extinct.  I  would  never  believe 
that  in  fifty  years  those  great  myriads  of  migra- 
tion ducks  could  have  been  exterminated.  In 
years  gone  by  1  have  often  wondered  where  so 
many  species  of  the  duck  family  sprang  from, 
so  much  more  so  than  the  dry  land  birds.  The 
book  name  of  many  birds  is  derived  from  habits 
and  their  dress,  as  the  green-head  mallard,  the 
spike-tail  which  has  only  two  long  pointed 
feathers  in  their  tail.  The  wood-duck,  some- 
times called  the  tree-duck  from  the  fact  that 
they  build  their  nests  in  old  snags   and  hollow 

159 


BARRb:L-HOlJSE  BLIND 
trees  and  sometimes  they  are  called  the  nut- 
hatch, but  1  have  never  heard  where  she  got  the 
name.  But  like  any  hunter  who  kills  a  duck 
and  does  not  know  the  name  of  it  he  can  offer  a 
guess.  The  wood-ducks  build  their  nests  in 
hollow  trees.  Sometimes  the  flying  squirrel  or 
wood-mice  will  carry  a  few  butter-nuts  or  beach 
nuts  in  a  wood-duck's  nest  to  crack  at  his  leis- 
ure and  perhaps  some  early  observers  found 
these  nuts  in  a  wood  duck's  nest  and  jokingly 
accused  the  duck  of  trying  to  hatch  them.  I 
have  come  to  the  conclusion  that  this  is  the 
way  that  so  many  new  names  of  ducks  have 
sprung  up  in  later  years.  A  few  days  later  we 
broke  camp  and  moved  out  of  the  marsh, 
scarcely  a  duck  was  to  be  seen.  This  was  the 
first  portable  blind  or  tub-shooting  ever  done  on 
the  Kankakee.  A  year  or  so  later  there  were 
scores  of  sink  tubs  in  use  but  of  a  different  type. 
They  were  made  of  galvanized  sheet  iron  most- 
ly instead  of  an  old  kerosene  barrel,  and  while  I 
do  not  want  to  claim  anything  new    in   shooting 

160 


PlONEhR  HUN'lhRS  OF  THE  KANKAKLL 
from  a  blind,  for  that  mode  of  hunting  is  as  old 
as  man,  only  an  improvement  of  the  system 
during  those  early  days.  They  were  many 
marked  hunters  and  very  few  of  their  names  I 
can  recall  except  the  Cannons.  Roots,  /Aore- 
houses,  Starkeys  and  scores  of  others  whose 
names  1  have  forgotten.  Harry,  my  half  broth- 
er, was  a  star  wing-shot  and  last  but  not  least 
were  the  Qilson  boys,  cd  and  Billy,  who  were 
believed  by  many  to  be  the  best  shots  on  the 
river,  i  remember  one  time,  many  years  ago, 
before  breech-loaders  came  in  use,  one  of  them 
killed  one  hundred  and  ninety  ducks  and  eight 
geese  in  one  day's  shooting  using  a  muzzle 
loader.  It  was  during  the  early  seventies  that 
Kankakee  region  reached  the  zenith  of  its  glory 
as  a  hunting  resort.  /Ay  first  shooting  was  done 
from  a  boat.  In  some  seasons  we  would  have 
splendid  shooting  and  in  others  not  so  good, 
this  depended  on  the  weather  conditions.  The 
marshes  seemed  to  be  the  natural  feeding 
grounds,    especially    for   the  diving  ducks.     But 

161 


BAF<Ri':L-f{OUSK  iJiJND 
the  dredging  of  great  ditches  through  the  low- 
lands letting  the  water  off  caused  the  glory  of 
the  Kankakee  AXarshes  to  depart.  1  only  wish 
1  had  the  abiiiiy  to  describe  and  make  you  feel 
the  beauty  of  these  marsh  islands  to  those  of 
my  readers  who  may  not  have  seen  them.  Pic- 
ture the  prairie  marshes  for  miles  and  miles  iii 
length  and  from  two  to  twelve  miles  in  width 
and  dotted  v/iih  hundreds  of  small  islands  and 
ridges  containing  from  one-half  to  twenty  acres. 
The  one  that  we  were  camped  upon  contained 
about  four  acres.  The  lofty  sycamore  with  its 
white  bark  can  be  seen  for  miles  as  they  rose 
above  the  mammoth  oak  and  down  from  its 
limbs  dropped  ropes  of  creeping  grape-vines. 
v/hile  there  were  many  others  covered  with  huc- 
kleberry bushes.  There  were  many  different 
species  of  birds  which  inhabited  these  islands. 
Among  the  game  birds  were  several  species  of 
the  snipe  family  which  nests  and  rears  its  young 
during  the  nesting  season.  The  wood-duck  also 
also  inhabited  these  islands  and  a  half  dozen  or 

U)2 


PIONEER  HUNTERS  OF  THE  KANKAK  iCK" 
more  other  varieties  of  ducHs  nesting  on  or  near 
an  island.  Also,  in  early  times  it  was  a  great 
nesting  place  for  wild  geese  and  for  this  reason 
a  portion  of  this  great  marsh  in  northern  Jasper 
County  along  the  Kankakee  Swamp  timber  was 
known  as  Goose  Lake  but  generally  known 
among  the  latter-day  hunters  as  Goose  Pond, 
where  thousands  of  geese  would  flock  to  roost 
at  night;  and  in  the  morning  they  would  leave 
for  the  feeding  grounds,  usually  on  some  farm- 
er's wheat  or  cornfields.  When  they  would  rise 
from  the  water  the  air  was  filled  with  birds  and 
the  flop  of  their  wings  as  they  rise  have  the 
sound  of  an  express  train  rumbling  ov^r  a 
bridge.  Now  1  have  tried  to  picture  this  great 
pond  at  twilight  or  daybreak.  It  stands  out  in 
memory  as  one  of  the  most  beautiful  I  have 
ever  seen  in  a  country  abounding  in  marshes,  a 
lake  where  the  surroundings  were  not  marred 
by  man  and  given  over  to  the  wild  things  that 
love  the  silent  places.  Another  time  I  was  out 
duck  hunting  and  we  had  in  camp   a    hunter  of 

1  63 


n.\Ri<i:L-i{Oi?sr:  Bf.iND 

many  years  experience  but  when  he  came  to 
camp  in  the  evening  his  strinq  would  show  only 
a  few  birds  and  when  asked  what  was  the  rea- 
son he  said  he  didn't  know  unless  it  was  that 
the  feathers  carried  away  the  birds.  This  hap- 
pened to  m.e  many  times  and  "Understand,  old- 
timers.  I  am  not  telling  you  that  every  shot  i 
fired  biought  down  a  bird."  Not  by  any  means. 
for  many  were  the  foxy  old  birds  that  1  shot  at 
and  missed  or  as  the  old-time  hunters  termed  it, 
another  case  where  the  feathers  carried  away 
the  meat.  As  times  passes  and  years  unfold,  it  is 
a  matter  of  intense  interest  to  the  water-fowl 
hunters  hov/  certain  varieties  of  duck  grow 
scarce  and  others  come  into  prominence,  which 
in  early  years  was  unknown  to  the  hunting  fra- 
ternity. This  is  remarkably  true  of  several 
species  and  particularly  applies  to  nearly  every 
variety  of  large  kucks  known  in  the  Kankakee 
River  Region.  As  I  have  said,  many  varieties 
of  ducks,  plentiful  fifty  years  ago,  are  now  almost 
exterminated  and  where  we  ran  our  boats   over 

164 


PIONEER  HUNTERS  OE  THE  KANKAKEE 
the  marshes  and  where  I  sat  in  my  kerosene 
barrel  blind  and  shot  ducks  almost  fifty  years 
ago  now  stands  the  farmer's  house  in  the  corn- 
fields and  the  scene  of  those  by-gone  days  still 
clings  to  my  memory.  How  often  do  my 
thoughts  drift  back  to  those  camp  days.  What 
a  lot  more  fun  can  a  fellow  have  in  a  hunter's 
lodge  or  trapper's  shanty  costing  about  fifteen 
dollars  amidst  its  natural  surroundings,  than  in 
a  ten  thousand  dollar  mansion  with  its  artificial 
environments.  Every  hunter  has  a  hobby  and 
some  have  two,  as  it  was  with  me  in  my  youth- 
ful days,  It  has  been  said  that  hobbies  belong 
to  the  human  and  are  a  part  of  the  Creator's 
birthright.  The  human  nature  glories  of  pos- 
session, both  good  and  bad  and  all  valuable.  It 
has  been  said  by  scholarly  m2n  that  hobbies  of 
sane  men  often  discount  the  dreams  of  an  idiot, 
nevertheless  we  have  them  just  the  same.  I 
loved  hunting  with  a  gun  on  the  waters  and  dry 
land,  I  also  enjoyed  fully  as  well  hunting  with 
a  good   dog   on  the  ice.     Now  before  breaking 

165 


IJARRKL-llOUS!';    lUJND 
Ccunp    and     leaving     the     Kankakee     hunting 
grounds  to  the  agriculturist,  which  is  now  pass- 
ing into  its  third  stage  of  development.  I  want  to 
tell    the    readers    ot  another  type    of    hunters 
known  as  the  fur  hunters,  and  their  hunting  out- 
fit consisted  of  a  good  dog    or   two,   an    axe,    a 
shovel  and  a  rat  spear.     I  have  told  the    reader 
how    we    hunted   the  deer,  shot  the  wild  geese, 
trapped  wild  animals.     Now  I  will  relate  how  we 
hunted  the  ring-tail,  raccoon,  mink    and    musk- 
rat,  and  occasionally  an  otter  but  not  very  often 
as  they  stay  close  to  deep  water.     If  there   was 
snow   on   the    ice   the    coon    and     mink    were 
tracked  to   their   dens    and    the    musk-rat    was 
speared  in  his  house  with    a    long   two-pronged 
spear  jabbed  through  the  house    where  the    rats 
'Stayed  during  the  day.     But  the  coon  and  mink 
were  mostly  hunted    with    dogs.     Scores   of   fur 
hunters    who    hunted    the   swamps    with     dogs 
never  hunted  with  a  gun  at  all    and    the    hunter 
who  owned  a  good  coon  or  mink    dog   in   those 
days  had  something   that    was    valuable,     One 

1^6 


PIONEER  HUNTERS  Oh  THE  KANKAKEE 

time  whilst  in  camp  on  one  of  those  swamp 
islands  quite  near  our  camp  was  a  half-breed 
Indian's  hnt  and  with  the  hope  of  securing  e  few 
matches  I  called  at  his  hut  and  found  that  he 
was  the  owner  of  a  very  valuable  coon  dog. 
judging  from  the  number  of  hides  that  1  saw 
sticking  around  in  the  hut.  Not  seeing  any  dog 
around  1  inquired  what  kind  of  a  dog  he  hunted 
with,  lie  said  that  he  had  an  imported  coon 
dog  from  /Aissouri.  Now  believing  that  many 
of  my  readers  who  are  lovers  of  a  good  dog  will 
be  interested  with  the  true  meaning  of  a  good 
coon,  dog  I  will  briefly  relate  fhe  story  told  by 
the  owner  of  the  dog  "Auck."  as  that  was  his 
name.  He  was  a  black-tan  English  fox  hound 
and  was  born  in  the  Ozark  /fountains  in  south- 
ern /Missouri  and  in  those  days  the  /"Aissouri 
mountains  were  alive  with  raccoons  and  hunting 
coons  was  sort  of  hereditary  with  A\uck.  When 
but  a  few  days  old  and  before  his  eyes  had 
opened  he  and  his  two  brothers  were  bought  by 
a  Kankakee  hunter  and  brought  to  the    Kanka- 

167 


BARRKL-HOUSt.  lU.liND 
kee  Swamps  and  turned  over  to  a  bull   bitch   to 
be   mothered   and   cared   for.     With  their  keen 
scent  of  inheritance  and  the  viciousness  of  their 
foster  mother  they  were  made  the  most  famous 
hunting  dogs  that  ever  hunted  in  the   Kankakee 
Swamps  and  those  puppies   with   no   pedigree 
other  than  that  of  a    /Missouri    hound,    sold   for 
one  hundred  and  fifty  dollars  each.    Their  quali- 
fications, nerve  and  size  for  the  hunters  of   coon 
and    mink   in   the  swamps   on  the  ice  in  those 
days  made  them  valuable  not  only  for  coon  and 
mink  hunting  but   they    were   trained    for   other 
game— deer,   wolves  and    loxes,     One  of  them 
fell   into   the   hands  of  a  noted  deer  hunter.  Ed 
/AcNeel.  and  when  the   dog   was   eleven   years 
old  he  refused  an  offer  of  two   hundred   dollars, 
offered   by   some   /Michigan   deer   hunter    who 
wanted  the  old  dog  to  train  some   young  ones. 
1  have  an  old  note  book  made  of  hunting  events 
of  years  ago.     Its  covers  are  tattered,  dirty   and 
faded,  and  on  the  outside   shows    plainly   upon 
its  shabby  service  the  ravage  of  time   and  evl- 

168 


PlONliER  HUN'JERS  OF  THE  KANKAKEE 
dence  of  wear  and  tear.  But  its  pages  are  full 
of  happy  memories  of  by-gone  days  and  recol- 
lections stir  me  as  1  open  the  old  book.  What  a 
blessed  gift  is  memory  of  all  the  many  gifts  of  an 
all-wise,  beneficient  Creator,  The  gift  of  mem- 
ory I  believe  to  be  the  most  precious  of  all,  A 
person  may  lose  his  possessions,  be  deprived  of 
sight  or  the  loss  of  a  limb  but  once  having  seen 
and  enjoyed  these  things  the  memory  will  re- 
main whilst  life  and  intellect  last  and  can  be  re- 
called at  most  any  time.  When  1  turn  over  the 
dim  and  faded  pages  1  am  back  again  in  the  old 
Kankakee  Swamps.  What  events  in  hunting 
you  can  remember,  Friend  Hunter.  What  glor- 
ious happenings  occured  when  you  were  present 
to  behold  them.  Every  hunter  keeps  in  his 
memory  to  the  last  some  wonderful  performance 
of  the  hunting  grounds.  He  has  only  to  shut  his 
eyes  and  see  again  the  shots  or  catch,  just  as  it 
was  made,  even  though  it  might  have  been  forty, 
fifty  or  even  seventy-five  years  ago  and  the 
smallest  details  of  the   great    achievements   will 

169 


BARR't^.-HOnSK  BLIND 
never  pass  from  his  recollections.  Every  old- 
lime  hunter  has  a  string  oi  such  memories  to 
think  back  upon.  What  were  the  most  wonder- 
ful happenings  of  all.  it  has  been  said,  that  the 
hunters  love  best  the  trapping  side  of  hunting. 
While  this  might  be  true  from  the  financial  side 
yet  ask  any  old  timer  to  tell  of  five  great  events 
of  happenings  of  things  he  saw  and  four  of  them 
will  be  tales  of  hunting  with  the  gun.  Think  it 
over  and  see  if  it  isn't  strictly  true.  The  mem- 
ory of  hunting  glories  lingers  longer  and  the 
thoughts  of  many  great  shots  made  will  come 
sooner  to  the  recollection  than  any  achieve- 
ment made  with  the  rod  or  traps.  The  hunters 
who  were  there  (I  wasn't)  have  always  claimed 
thai  the  greatest  of  all  rifle  shots  ever  made  in 
the  Kankakee  Swamps  was  made  on  Long 
Kidge  about  fifty  years  ago  by  a  hunter  named 
Hall,  who  is  now  dead.  Mall  was  a  native  o^ 
Jasper  County  and  a  deer  hunter  by  trade.  Me 
and  Harrison  Dalson  hunted  deer  together  a 
great  deal  and  were  together   on  the  day   that 

170 


PIONEER  HUNTERS  OF  THE  KANKAKEE 
Hall  made  the  great  shot.  Two  deer  came 
dashing  by  liall,  running  in  opposite  directions, 
and  when  they  came  opposite  of  each  other 
Hall  took  aim  and  fired.  The  ball  passed 
through  the  body  of  the  first  deer  Hilling  it  in- 
stantly and  struck  the  other  deer  under  the 
shoulder  between  the  first  and  second  ribs  and 
lodged  near  the  heart  and  a  few  bounds  more 
and  it  fell  dead.  A  few  days  later  /Ar.  Dalson 
was  out  hunting  in  the  swamp  when  he  came 
upon  two  big  bucks  fighting.  They  had  locked 
their  horns  so  tight  together  that  they  could  not 
separate  themselves,  he  shot  one  and  knocked 
the  other  in  the  head  with  his  hunting  axe.  He 
hung  them  up  and  went  home  and  told  Hal! 
that  he  no  longer  had  the  best  of  him,  for  he 
had  killed  two  deer  with  only  one  shot.  Hall, 
wouldn't  believe  it  at  first  but  when  he  could  not 
find  any  bullet  hole  in  one  of  the  bucks,  only 
where  it  had  been  hit  on  the  head  with  the  pole 
of  an  axe.  Yet  he  was  entitled  to  claim  the 
champion  shot  having  killed    his   two,   running 

171 


BARRKL-HOUSt  BLIND 
with  one  bullet.  /Aany  years  ago  Father  Hilled 
two,  a  doe  and  a  fawn,  at  one  shot.  They  were 
standing  still.  lie  had  trailed  them  into  a  red- 
brush  thicket  where  the  brush  was  so  thick  that 
one  could  not  see  only  a  short  distance.  The 
red-brush  is  a  species  of  scrub-oak  that  grows 
on  the  sand  ridges.  They  hold  their  leaves  on 
all  winter,  making  it  a  great  hiding  place  for 
deer.  Looking  under  the  bushes  Father  saw 
what  he  thought  was  a  deer's  legs  but  could 
not  see  any  part  of  the  body.  Raising  the 
trusty  old  rifle  to  his  shoulder  he  aimed  where 
he  thought  its  body  v/ould  be  and  fired.  At  the 
crack  of  the  gun  away  bounded  a  deer.  He 
went  to  where  he  thought  the  deer  was  standing 
and  there  lay  one  too  dead  to  kick.  To  solve 
the  mystery  he  looked  at  the  tracks  of  the  one 
that  ran  away  and  discovered  great  splotshcs  of 
blood  on  the  snow.  Following  the  trail  thirty- 
five  or  forty  yards  he  found  the  doe  kicking  her 
last  kick.  The  bullet  had  passed  through  the 
fawn  and  lodged  in  the  shoulder  of  the  doe.     As 

172 


PIONEER  HUNTERS  OF  THE  KANKAKEE 

they  stood  side  by  side,  only  a  few  feet  apart, 
they  were  Killed  by  the  same  bullet.  The  inci- 
dents just  mentioned  are  only  a  few  of  the  mem- 
orable shots.  What  hunters  have  seen  such 
doings,  or  rather,  where  is  there  any  hunter  who 
never  saw  things  just  as  wonderful? 


!73 


CHAPTER  XV 
DRAlNIN(i  TIll^:  SWAMPS 

WHERE   THE 

IN(^.ENlJ^r^■  oe  has 

DEFEATEi)    THE  DESIGNS  OF  NATURE 

BY  ERASING  THE  KANKAKE  SWAMPS  OFF  THE 

MAP.      THE  OLD  RIVER  AND  THE 

ONCE  FAMOUS    HUNTING 

(GROUNDS  A    PAS'E 

MEMORY 

It  is  not  my  purpose  to  write  the  story  of  the 
reclaiming  or  rather,  the  story  of  the  new  Kan- 
kakee f^iver.  as  it  is  a  history  in  itself,  in  our 
childhood  we  were  taught  by  our  teacher  and 
the  geography  that  this  vast  region  was  a  great 
swamp  and  by  the  term  "swamp"  it  means  a 
low  depression  in  the  earth's  surface  and  this 
was  filled  with  water  and  mud  and  by  applying 
the  term  "swamp"  this  vast  Kankakee  Region 
made  a  very  large  mud-hole.  This  teaching 
was  a  great  hinderance  to  the  settling  up  of  this 
country  and  many  men  and   women   still   cling 

174 


PIONEER  HUNTERS  OK  1  HE  K:aNKA[CP:E 
tenaciously  to  that  teaching.  Up  to  a  quarter 
of  a  century  ago  any  mention  of  the  Kankakee 
Swamps  called  up  visions  of  a  region  of  limit- 
less extent  of  swamps  and  marshes,  uninhabited 
and  desolate,  a  country  always  associated  with 
tales  of  suffering  and  death,  of  unfriendly  sav- 
ages and  wild  animals.  For  years  this  country 
was  passed  over  by  hunters  and  prospectors 
and  was  considered  worthless,  but  the  marvel- 
ous transformation  which  has  taken  place  in  the 
last  three  decades  in  the  land  of  silence  and 
sunshine,  furnishes  one  of  the  most  interesting 
and  inspiring  pages  in  the  history  of  our  great 
Kankakee  development.  The  Kankakee  swamp 
is  vanishing  from  the  map.  its  boundaries  have 
shrunken  and  it  is  no  longer  presenting  a  for- 
midable barrier  to  the  growth  and  progress  of 
northwestern  Indiana.  There  was  at  that  ti.me 
several  hundred  thousand  acres  of  this  water- 
soaked,  craw-fish  country  that  has  been  re- 
claimed by  means  of  dredging,  that  are  now 
producing  bountiful  harvests.     Every  year  hun- 

17.S 


DRAINING  1  HK  SvvAMPS 
dreds  of  people  are  residing  on  farms  now  that 
a  few  years  ago  were  musH-rat  ponds.  Years 
ago  tt  was  a  very  common  thing  to  hear  of 
some  Eastern  speculator  being  taken  in  by  one 
of  those  swamp-land  swindlers.  They  would 
plat  out  a  tract  of  swamp  land,  go  East  to  find 
their  victim  and  trade  or  sell  a  tract  of  this  land 
to  some  speculator.  One  /'Ar.  Jones,  of  Dayton. 
Ohio,  was  taken  in  by  some  swindler  in  this  way 
and  when  he  came  to  look  for  his  land  he  could 
not  find  it  as  it  was  covered  with  water  from  one 
to  five  feet  deep  and  the  way  that  Jones  told  it 
was  more  amusing  than  true.  Jones  said  he 
was  a  victim  of  mispleced  confidence.  He  had 
traded  for  a  tract  of  land  on  the  Kankakee 
River  and  was  making  a  trip  down  the  river  in 
search  oi  his  land.  He  said  that  it  had  two 
good  houses  on  it  and  was  near  a  town.  I 
should  judge  from  his  description  of  the  country 
that  he  was  looking  for  his  farm.  That  the  town 
and  houses  must  of  been  musk-rat  houses  and 
the  town  must  have  been  a  rat-town.      I  would 

176 


PIONEER  HUNTERS  OF  THE  KANKAKEE 
term  it  such  from  the  inhabitants  of  the  place  as 
I  have  experienced  just  such  a  joke  myself 
many  years  ago  whilst  I  wasan  overland  freight- 
er on  the  western  plains.  We  would  work  this 
gag  on  the  tenderfoot  that  would  come  along 
inquiring  if  there  were  any  settlements  or  set- 
tlers living  anywhere  near,  The  answer  was 
most  always  in  the  affirmative  and  if  they  would 
go  to  such  and  such  a  place  there  was  quite  a 
settlement  and  a  large  town.  The  tenderfoot  on 
going  to  the  place  directed  would  find  it  inhabit- 
ed by  a  lively  little  four-footed  tribe  known  as 
prairie  dogs.  (I  have  hunted  for  these  towns 
myself.)  This  is  about  such  a  farm  that  /Ar. 
Jones  had  traded  for  instead  of  two  good  farms 
and  houses.  They  were  musk-rat  houses.  It 
was  in  sixty-nine  (the  wet  season)  when  Jones 
made  his  trip  down  the  Kankakee  and  the  re- 
sources of  tlie  country  were  not  so  well  de- 
veloped then  as  they  are  now,  and  his  story  of 
what  he  saw  is  more  amusing  than  jest,  so  far 
as  the  truth  is  concerned,     fie  says   Indiana    is 


DRAININCJ  ll-IE  SWAMPS 
a  delightful  country  or  will  be  when  it  is  finished. 
The  State  is  big  enough  and  a  considerable  por- 
tion of  it  has  a  good  foundation.  What  it  wants 
is  building  up.  There  is  plenty  of  water  and 
sand,  pucker-brush,  roots  and  cotton  trees, 
swamps  and  marshes  and  a  wonderful  vegeta- 
tion of  grass  and  vines  and  wild  flowers.  What 
it  wants  is  more  land,  at  least  what  a  Hoosier 
calls  land.  But  it  is  coming  on.  Thousands  of 
acres  of  this  Kankakee  /Aarsh  where  the  musk- 
rat  houses  used  to  stand  now  stands  the  golden 
grain  shocks.  Wnat  the  change  that  will  be 
made  in  the  next  quarter  of  a  century  is  I  leave 
to  the  reader  to  guess  at,  /Ar.  Jones  then  goes 
on  to  say  that  he  did  not  trade  for  a  musk-rat 
town  or  a  cotton-wood  grove,  Being  discour- 
aged because  anyone  could  have  a  town  who 
would  take  a  boat  and  go  out  in  the  swamp 
with  a  surveyor  and  make  a  map  of  a  musk-rat 
pond,  big  house  and  population.  The  White 
Star  was  making  a  trip  up  the  river  to  Baum's 
Bridge  when  she    met  /Ar.  Jones,  the  Ohio  land 

178 


PIONEER  HUNTERS  OF  THE  tCANKAKEE 
speculator,  who  was  sailing  over  the  marshes 
hunting  for  his  farm.  The  steamer  had  struck  a 
snag  and  the  crew  was  at  work  getting  loose 
when  Jones  and  his  party  came  up.  He  began 
telling  the  crew  how  tired  he  was  of  water  and 
marshes  and  more  water  and  scraggley  brush 
and  more  water.  Finally  he  bluffed  the  captain 
of  the  White  Star  by  saying:  "Coptain,  what  is 
the  average  price  of  land  up  in  this  part  of  the 
country.  By  the  gallon,  1  think."  .^r.  Jones 
was  tired  of  his  Kankakee  land  speculation 
when  he  made  his  trip  down  the  Kankakee. 
Aany  other  Easterners  have  been  taken  in  the 
same  way  by  buying  or  trading  Kankakee  land 
without  seeing  it  and  when  they  come  to  look 
for  the  land  it  is  out  of  sight,  covered  with 
water.  Sometimes  this  region  was  called  "the 
land  that  God  forgot  to  finish."  To  my  mind  it 
was  finished  just  as  the  Almighty  intended  it  to 
be,  it  was  left  for  man  to  finish.  And  now  1  am 
going  to  tell  you  in  part  how  it  was  done.  5y 
the  ingenuity  of  man,  assisted  by  the  State  gov- 


5  79 


DkAINMNC;  ll-H':  SWAMPS 
eminent,  is  due  the  credit  of  erasing  the  swamp 
from  our  map  and  converting  the  counlry,  which 
God  forgot,  into  pleasant  places  for  the  habita- 
tion of  man.  At  this  time  there  was  between 
four  and  five  hundred  thousand  acres  of  this 
land  practically  water-soaked  and  v/orthless. 
Now  it  is  drained  by  these  engineering  workers. 
This  work  of  the  State  f^eclaiming  Service  af- 
fords many  examples  of  man's  audacity  of  de- 
feating the  designs  of  nature,  This  draining 
movement  originated  way  back  in  the  early 
fifties  when  the  Governor  of  Indiana  recom- 
mended a  bill  to  the  Legislature  for  the  redeem- 
ing of  the  sv/amp  lands  along  the  Kankakee 
Valley.  That  it  was  the  State's  duty  to  the 
great  agricultural  class  of  the  'Kankakee  Valley 
that  the  farmers  of  this  region  have  contributed 
a  greater  service  to  the  people  of  the  state  than 
can  ever  be  repaid.  The  landowners  themselves 
in  an  overgight  of  the  law  regarding  the  sale  and 
drainage  of  swamp  lands  have  willingly  bought 
and  paid  foi  these  lands  and  then  taxed   them- 

180 


PIONEER  HUNTERS  OF  THE  KANKAtCEK 
selves  for  the  drainage  besides.  Article  Eight, 
Section  Two  of  the  Constitution  for  the  State  of 
Indiana  which  is  as  follows:  "All  lands  that  have 
been  or  may  be  hereafter  gianted  to  the  State 
where  no  special  purpose  is  expressed  in  the 
grant  and  the  proceeds  of  the  sale  thereof,  in- 
cluding the  proceeds  of  the  sale  of  the  swamp 
land  granted  to  the  State  of  Indiana  by  the  act 
of  Congress  on  the  28th  day  of  September, 
1850."  In  the  same  section  implies  that  the 
swamp  lands  were  granted  to  the  state  on  con- 
dition that  the  money  derived  from  the  sale  of 
those  lands  be  used  in  the  drainage  of  the  same. 
That  part  of  the  contract,  sorry  to  say,  has  never 
been  carried  out.  As  I  have  said,  all  great 
movements  have  their  beginning.  So  it  was 
with  the  drainage  of  the  Kankakee  Swamps.  In 
the  early  fifties  a  bunch  of  men,  afterwards 
known  as  the  Kankakee  Swamp  Land  Swind- 
lers, went  into  an  agreemeni  with  the  State 
Authorities  at  Indianapolis  to  drain  a  certain 
amount  of  the    Kankakee    marshes    by   digging 

181 


DRAlNINCi  THE  SWAMPS 
big  ditches  and  emptying  them  in  the  river  and 
they  were  to  take  a  certain  percent  of  the  land 
drained  for  their  pay.  They  dug  a  few  small 
ditches  on  range  and  section  lines,  reported 
same  to  the  state  authorities  and  received  their 
land  grants  for  several  thousand  acres  of  swamp 
land  without  ever  draining  an  acre  of  the  land. 
They  sold  and  traded  great  tracts  of  this  land  to 
Eastern  speculators  who  never  saw  the  land  be- 
fore buying  it  and  in  some  instances  they  never 
saw  it  after  buying  it.  As  mention  has  before 
been  made,  when  they  came  to  look  for  their 
nev/  possessions  it  could  not  be  found  on  ac- 
count of  being  covered  with  water.  The  specu- 
lators could  see  no  future  for  such  a  desolate 
region  and  never  paid  the  taxes.  The  lands 
were  sold  for  taxes.  The  counties  held  the  tax 
sales  and  very  little  of  it  was  ever  redeemed  and 
the  land  went  back  to  the  State.  Occasionally 
in  later  years  some  of  these  tax  title  deeds  and 
swamp  land  sv/indlers'  deeds  are  heard  of  in  the 
district  courts.     The  state  issued  the  land  grants 

182 


inONKER  HUNTERS  OF  THE  KANKAICEE 

in  good  faith  but  the  ditch  makers  did  not  fulfill 
their  part  of  the  agreement.  In  1834  the  State 
Authorities  ordered  a  swamp  land  ditch  com- 
missioner to  be  appointed  and  Aaron  Lytle,  of 
Valparaiso.  Ind,,  was  appointed  to  this  position 
and  was  the  first  ditch  commissioner  for  this 
district.  After  serving  about  a  year  and  a  half 
he  resigned  and  Ezriah  Freeman  was  appointed 
his  successor.  Commissioner  Lytle  had  a  few 
ditches  surveyed  out  and  dug.  They  were  sold 
out  in  sections  and  half  sections  just  as  much  as 
a  contractor  thought  he  could  construct.  State 
Ditch  No.  1  on  the  north  side  of  the  river  was 
the  first  ditch  dug  and  an  Irishman  by  the  name 
of  /AcDugal  contracted  for  the  first  two  mile  sec- 
tions and  John  Broady  of  Three  f\ivers,  /Michi- 
gan, bought  the  third  and  half  of  the  fourth  sec- 
tions one  and  a  half  miles.  State  Ditch  No.  2 
was  run  farther  east  beginning  at  the  river  and 
running  up  old  Sandy  Hook  to  where  it  inter- 
sected with  Ditch  No.  1  near  an  island  called 
Bridge  Island.      I  might  explain  here  why  it  de- 

183 


DRAINING  THE  SWAMPS 
rived  that  name  is  from  the  fact  that  at  this 
place  is  where  the  first  wagon  road  crossed 
Sandy  MooH,  Early  in  the  seventies  a  wagon 
bridge  was  built  across  the  East  Channel  of 
Sandy  Hook  from  the  main  land  to  the  Island,  a 
little  over  five  hundred  feet  long,  Previous  to 
the  building  of  the  bridge  the  channel  was  ford- 
ed during  low  water  and  footmen  crossed  the 
channel  in  boats.  Getting  back  to  the  subject, 
these  ditches  were  dug  by  hand  with  pick  and 
shovel  and  were  twelve  feet  wide  for  the  first 
three  miles  then  eight  feet  wide  to  the  source. 
The  two  ditches  that  1  have  mentioned  were  the 
first  Stale  ditches  dug  in  the  Kankakee  Valley 
They  were  practically  a  failure.  At  the  lower 
end  where  they  emptied  their  waters  into  the 
Kankakee  they  filled  up  on  account  of  bach 
water  when  the  river  was  high  and  the  ditch 
was  of  little  use  at  all.  as  they  had  to  be  cleaned 
and  recleaned  every  few  years  costing  the  land- 
owners several  thousand  dollars  at  each  opera- 
tion which  means  that  these  people  have   spent 

184 


PIONEER  HUNTERS  OF  THE  KANKAKE!' 
nearly  one  hundred  thousand  dollars  of  their 
own  money  without  as  yet  realizing  the  desired 
benefit.  /Aost  of  these  settlers  bought  this  poor, 
wet  land  with  limited  capital  and  are  improving 
it  under  hard  conditions.  Legally  and  by  all 
rights  the  State  owes  to  the  land-owners  of  the 
Kankakee  River  Region  every  dollar  that  has 
been  spent  in  the  reclaiming  of  these  lands.  As 
I  have  said  all  great  improvements  have  their 
beginning.  So  in  the  summer  of  eighty-six  was 
the  date  of  the  digging  of  the  Cass  and  Single- 
ton big  ditch  in  Lake  County  and  it  was  the  first 
dredge  ditch  dug  for  the  reclaiming  of  the  swamp 
region.  Since  that  there  have  been  many 
ditches  constructed  on  both  sides  of  the  river 
running  parallel  with  the  stream  One  of  great 
importance  was  the  drainage  of  English  Lahe 
some  years  ago,  Three  years  ago  was  com- 
menced the  reclaiming  ditch,  the  new  Kankakee 
River,  by  straightening  the  old  river  which  was 
so  crooked  in  its  course  that  it  almost  crossed 
itself.     In  a  distance  of  forty    miles,  straight  line, 

185 


»     J    J  3     O 


DRAINING  THK  SWAMPS 
it  ran  near  one  hundred  and  fifty  miles,  under- 
mining big  trees  along  its  banks  tliat  would  tum- 
ble down  in  the  river  and  v\^ash  out  great  holes 
in  one  place  and  fill  up  in  another,  making  it  a 
slow,  sluggish  stream,  In  high  water  it  would 
spread  out  over  the  swamps  and  marshes  for 
miles  on  each  side  of  the  river,  Since  the  con- 
struction of  the  big  ditch  the  water  is  all  confined 
to  this  channel,  if  some  of  these  swamp  land 
speculators  could  return  to  this  region  they 
find  what  they  were  looking  for  fourty  or  fifty 
years  ago.  The  large  land  owners  such  as 
Cass  &  Singleton.  Gifford,  of  Kankakee  City, 
Illinois,  and  Nelson  Morris,  the  Chicago  meat 
packer,  and  many  others  who  owned  large 
tracts  of  swamp  lands  were  strong  in  favor  of 
draining  whilst  many  others  were  opposed  to 
tiic  movement,  especially  the  huuters  and  trap- 
pers who  said  that  it  would  ruin  their  business, 
that  the  Kankakee  Swamps  were  more  valuable 
for  their  furs  than  they  were  for  their  agricul- 
tural purposes.     The  money   that   was   brought 

186 


PlONtLR  HUiNTERSOF   IHE  KANKAK,«L 

into  this  country  for  tlie  sale  of  furs  amounts  to 
between  sixty-five  and  seventy-five  thousand 
dallars  every  year,  that  the  revenue  for  furs 
alone  from  18  50  to  1900  amounts  to  over 
three  million  dollars.  Furs  vary  greatly  in 
price  from  one  year  to  the  next.  Sut  only  dur- 
ing the  fifty  years  was  there  one  good  prime  rat 
hide  brought  in  selling  for  thirty-three  cents.  In 
those  days  a  musk-rat  hide  would  brin^^  from 
three  to  ten  cents  a  hide.  Father  predicted  that 
the  day  would  come  when  a  good  prime  rat 
skin  would  sell  for  a  dollar.  Fifty-two  years 
later  in  1920  his  prediction  came  true,  when  he 
saw  good  prime  rat  skins  sell  for  four  dollars 
and  ten  cents  apiece.  In  those  days  it  took  n 
rat  skin  to  buy  a  common  sewing  needle.  A 
French  fur  trader  by  the  name  of  Cuttauh  from 
Detroit,  /Aichigan,  used  to  buy  furs  in  this  re- 
gion and  he  told  the  trappers'  wives  that  they 
had  better  buy  in  a  good  supply  of  needles,  as 
the  needle-maker  was  dead  and  that  they  would 
not  get  any  more  needles  very  soon.     Upon  the 

•     187 


fi^ssicr=asfr-|s^a- 


— * 


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4-  -:^^ 


.•^n  -^ 


^^ 


c 

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c 

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O 

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cz 

C 
re 


DRAINING  THE  SWAMPS 
strength  of  this  statement  he    traded   thousands 
of  needles  to  the  squaws  and  the    wives  of   the 
vyhitc    hunters,    in    exchange    he   gave   them  a 
needle    for   a    rat    skin.      This  vast  region  that 
was   considered    worthless   has    made    many  a 
man  a  small  fortune.     The  best  figures  obtained 
for  (he  am  )U':(  of  furs  caught  and    sold    by    the 
hunters  and. trappers  of  the  Kankakee  Swamps 
betv/^een  the  years  of '18 50  and  1900    was  ap- 
proxlmatciy    three    million,   seven  hundred  and 
iiily  thousand  dollars,  an  average  of  seventy-five 
thoLisand  per  year.       Whenever  there  was  a  bill 
up  before  the  legislature  for  an  appropriation  for 
the  drainage  of  th2  swamp  lands  there  was   al- 
ways enough  to  oppose  it  and  cause   its   defeat 
rip,c\  yet  the  water  soaked  lands    weie  doomed. 
Finally  ihe  fatal  day  came.    A  big  dredging  ma- 
chine  was   set   to  v/ork  In  the  river  a  few  miles 
above  f3a urn's  Bridge    and  excavated   a   great 
ditch   of   one    hundred   and    fifty   feet   in  width 
through  the  dense  forest.     Hence  the  new  Kan- 
kakee f^iver.     The   game   had  become   almost 

188 


PlONhER  HUN'l  ERS  OF  THE  KANKAKEE 

extinct  long  before  the  water  ever  flowed  in  the 
new  river.  The  last  deer  that  was  killed  in  the 
swamp,  to  my  knowledge,  was  killed  by  E,  D. 
Salsberry,  a  Panhandle  railroad  engineer  of  Lo- 
gansport,  Indiana,  in  his  Fall  hunt  of  1880. 
Salsberry  and  his  party  were  in  camp  on  Cor- 
nell Island  and  one  morning  he  and  ike  Shaw, 
another  Panhandle  engineer,  were  going  to  the 
South  /Aarsh  for  a  day's  shooting  and  in  going 
through  the  swamp  timber  a  deer  ran, across  the 
trail  and  Salsberry  shot  and  killed  it.  usin?  small 
bird  shot.  And  two  months  later  Father  killed 
one  on  the  North  /Aarsh.  These  were  the  last 
deer  ever  seen  alive  or  dead  in  this  part  of  the 
swamp  region.  The  story  of  the  Kankakee 
country  is  a  story  of  evolution  in  the  develop- 
ment of  a  country  richly  endowed  by  nature, 
and  a  story  of  neglected  opportunity,  neglected 
in  some  instances  not  from  lack  of  appreciation 
but  from  man's  natural  inclination  to  follow 
along  the  lines  of  least  resistance.  Nature  has 
done  so  much  for  this  favored  country   that   the 

189 


Camp  of  Logansport,  Ind.,  Hunters  on  Cornell's  Island 

on  the  Kankakee  in  1880 
Left  Camp — H.  J,  McSheehy,  John  Condon,  Sam  Doll, 
J.  B.  Messinger.     Right  Camp — Ed  Salsbury,  Ike  Shaw 


DRAINING  THE  SWAMPS 
struggle  for  existence  which  called  forth  man's 
best  energies,  eliminated.  It  was  easy  to  live, 
to  understand  the  slow  development  of  this  re- 
gion and  to  appreciate  the  rapid  progress  of 
later  years,  We  must  understand  its  geographi- 
cal location,  its  topographical  formation  and  the 
conditions  controlling  its  destiny.  Way  back, 
nearly  a  century  ago,  when  /Aajor  Long  ex- 
plored this  Kanhahee  region,  in  his  report  he 
gave  it  the  name  "Kankakee  Swamps."  The 
term  caught  the  fancy  of  the  public  and  has 
been  set  in  type  for  it  ever  since  and  it  is  impos- 
sible to  estimate  how  potent  a  factor  the  phrase 
has  been  in  retarding  the  growth  of  this  coun- 
try, Here,  as  well  as  in  most  all  new  territories, 
the  hunter  followed  close  on  the  foot-steps  of 
the  pathfinders  and  here,  indeed,  was  the  Hunt- 
er's Paradise,  Imagine,  if  you  can,  an  area  of 
several  hundred  thousand  acres  of  swamp  and 
marsh  land  and  abounding  with  wild  game  of 
all  kinds  and  the  river  alive  with  fish  of  the  best 
varieties  found  in  the  States.      While   the   deer. 

190 


PIONEER  HUN'lERS  OK   IHt  KANKAKKL 

wild-hog,  turkeys,  geese  and  ducks  made  the 
hunters  meat;  the  otter,  mink,  musk-rat.  raccoon, 
wolf,  fox.  lynx  and  wild-cat  were  the  fur-bearing 
animals.  It  surely  was  the  home  of  the  hunter 
and  trapper.  This  was  the  condition  of  the  re- 
gion when  the  f^edman  left  it  and  the  white 
hunter  built  his  cabin  on  the  wooded  islands 
and  the  shores  of  the  Kankakee.  Yet  many  of 
the  readers  wonder  why  white  men  with  their 
families  lived  in  so  secluded  a  spot.  Could  the 
hearts  of  the  hunters  ask  for  more;  could  nature 
more  bountifully  bestow  her  gifts?  That  he 
should  look  with  disapproval  on  the  swamps  is 
no  small  wonder.  But  by  and  by  the  man  with 
the  hoe  came  and  looked  upon  the  country  and 
it  seemed  to  him  that  this  swamp  region  was 
too  good  to  be  given  over  to  the  musk-rat  and 
the  raccoon  and  to  the  exclusive  use  of  the  few 
men  who  did  not  own  them  and  this  is  what 
brought  about  the  reclaiming  movement.  Un- 
der the  new  conditions,  with  the  advent  of  the 
Swamp  (Qifford)  f^ailroad.  the  Kankakee  swamp 

191 


DRAINING  THE  SWAMPS 
country  passed  into  its  second  stage  of  develop- 
nncnt  and  m  many  places  the  "hoodooed"  craw 
fish  flats  of  the  Kankakee  region  is  now  the 
Kankakee  Valley  corn  fields.  The  reclaiming 
of  the  Kankakee  swamps  cast  a  shadow  of 
gloom  and  sadness  to  the  few  remaining  old- 
time  hunters  who  have  spent  their  early  years 
hunting  and  trapping  on  the  Kankakee  river. 
They  feel  pretty  much  as  did  the  Indians  when 
they  had  to  give  up  their  ideal  hunting  grounds 
to  the  whites.  The  pioneer  hunter  saw  the 
French  fur-trader  and  the  Indian  go,  then  they 
saw  the  wild  game  go  and  now  what  is  left  of 
their  number  have  seen  the  vanishing  of  the 
Kankakee  swamps.  In  the  language  of  the 
poet  "There  is  a  magical  tie  to  the  land  of  our 
home,  which  the  heart  cannot  break  though  the 
footsteps  may  roam."  Yes,  indeed,  the  ties  that 
bind  us  to  the  land  of  our  birth  are  truly  magi- 
cal. 1  often  find  this  so  when  I  am  visiting  my 
old  home.  I  am  naturally  attracted  to  the 
scenes  that  1  loved  so  well  when  a    boy.     5o   it 

192 


PIONEER  HUNfERSOK  I'HK  KANKAKKh 
was  with  the  Indians  that  once  inhabited  this 
region.  The  reader  remembers  that  mention 
was  made  in  a  previous  chapter  of  my  visit  to 
the  Fottowattomies  in  the  Indian  Reservation. 
One  old  warrior,  Chief  Nae-nee-be-zho,  narrates 
the  sadness  and  sorrow  of  his  people.  Me  spoke 
of  the  whites,  of  the  white  man's  hunting  ground 
and  their  destiny.  He  told  how  they  would  van- 
ish and  be  no  more.  He  said  in  part,  "Oh, 
Great  Aaster.  the  pale-face  comes  and  the  f^ed- 
man  is  driven  from  the  face  of  the  earth.  The 
land  that  was  ours  is  gone  from  us  and  the 
rocks  are  our  bed  and  the  leaves  are  our  cover. 
We  sigh  in  vain  for  yesterday,  we  have  no  hope, 
no  comfort  for  tomorrow,  all  our  greatness  is 
gone  and  the  f^edman's  days  are  but  few,  1 
return  to  the  land  of  my  Father,  1  gaze  on  the 
placid  river.  Oh  that  1  might  die  and  sleep 
here  where  the  great  Waubonsie  breathed  the 
air,  beneath  the  same  trees  which  have  shelter- 
ed him.  Oh  where  are  the  friends  of  my  Father. 
where  is  the  war  chief   Waubonsie,    /Aeltontonis 

1V3 


I)  R  A  i  M  N  r  7  '  r  r  I !  s  vv  a  m  i  's 
and  many  others?  Oh,  could  I  stand  where  my 
tribes  once  roamed.  But  no  vestige  of  the  pow- 
erful Pottowattomies  remain.  The  lakes  and 
marshes  and  the  Kankakee  River,  which  my 
canoe  was  want  to  glide;  knows  not  the  dip 
of  the  Redman's  paddle.  Where  once  I  moored 
my  canoe  to  the  shore  of  Lake  ./Michigan  now 
the  great  steamers  are  at  anchor  and  the  dip  of 
the  Redman's  paddle  is  heard  no  more.  No 
more  does  the  flint-tipped  arrow  fall  the  deer 
and  the  woodlands  resound  no  more  with  his 
bounding  step  upon  the  brink  of  the  river.  But 
now  comes  the  pioneer's  cow  in  its  stead.  The 
majesty  of  nature  is  dwarfed  and  humbled  in 
the  marsh  of  the  white  man  and  on  his  trail  is 
naught  but  nature's  ruins.  I  gaze  on  the  camp 
of  the  white  man  and  hear  him  call  it  Chicago. 
Oh  Nau-nee-bo-zho,  forgive  the  cruel  pale-face 
for  disturbing  the  peace  of  the  great  Shaubanee, 
whose  home  was  along  the  Kankakee  f^egion. 
I  seek  for  the  wigwam  of  my  people  and  find  in 
its  place  the  houses  and  barns  of  the  white  man. 

194 


PIONEER  HUNTERS  OF  1  HE  KANKAKEE 

Again,  if  they  would  turn  to  the  spot  where  the 
great  Chiefs  held  their  councils  and  where  the 
pipe  of  peace  was  smoked  by  the  great  warriors 
they  would  find  cities,  towns  and  villages.  The 
brick  walls  rise  on  the  spot  where  once  the 
deer-skins  were  spread  and  the  great  oak  tree 
had  been  taken  away.  The  memories  of  the 
Redman  have  been  buried  beneath  the  white 
man's  axe,  trowel  and  plow.  Nau-nee-bee-zho 
could  not  understand  why  they  were  banished 
from  the  land  that  the  great  master  gave  them 
unless  it  was  for  the  treachery  of  Nau-non-gee, 
or  the  murderer  of  Red  Bird,  on  the  trail  that 
run  from  Pottowattomie  Ford  on  the  Kankakee 
(Eaton's  Ferry)  to  Lake  /Michigan.  Oh  memo- 
ries of  the  Kankakee,  which  was  the  ideal  hunt- 
ing ground  of  my  sire,  are  so  shattered,  all 
about  me  is  desolation  and  I  turn  from  the 
scene  which  1  sought  to  return  to  the  land  of  the 
setting  sun.  The  pale-face  has  no  love  fer  our 
memories  and  our  traditions  he  regardeth  not. 
Sad  is  the   heart  of   the    Redman.     Years   and 

195 


DRAININCJ  THE  SWAMPS 

years  ago  when  this  old  Indian  moved  his  beau- 
tiful squaw  to  French  Island,  now  the  home  of 
the  white  man,  and  in  the  same  swamp  where 
the  young  papoose  paddled  his  log  canoe  is 
now  the  Kankakee  corn-fields.  Where  the  war 
dance  made  the  air  ring  is  now  heard  the  brass 
band  playing  "Just  As  The  Sun  Went  Down." 
And  the  tolling  of  the  bells  in  the  towers  tells  of 
the  departure  of  the  Redman  who  worshipped 
the  Great  /Aaster.  In  the  quiet  groves  where 
the  sky  and  the  trees  were  not  shut  out  to  the 
f^edman,  nature  is  the  highest  art.  He  would 
sit  in  his  canoe  with  Okemoes  and  his  little 
papoose  floating  between  the  banks  over  the 
silvery  waves  of  the  river.  He  saw  in  the  Great 
/Aaster  everything.  There  was  no  black  smoke 
from  the  railroad  locomotive  and  traction  en- 
gines; no  fences  to  mar  the  beautiful  land  which 
the  Great  Father  had  given  to  them.  As  I  was 
about  to  leave  their  lodge  and  bidding  them 
good-bye.  one  of  the  old  warriors  rose  to  his 
feet,  threw  a  blanket  around  him  and  passed   to 

196 


PlONtER  HUiN'lERS  OF  THE  KANKAKEE 
and  fro,  saying  in  a  low,  sad  tone:  "Oh  gone  are 
the  days  of  my  youth  and  memories  of  my  peo- 
ple and  the  beauties  of   ouf   beautiful   land   are 
forever  buried.      /Ay  Father  and  myself  are  for- 
gotten, and  the  Land  of  Liberty  shall    know   us 
no  more."      When  1  visit  the  scenes  of  my  boy- 
hood where  1  played  with  the  pebbles  and  sand, 
where   years    before  played  the   little  papoose 
with  his  canoe  and  paddle,   and  when    I    recall 
some   of  my   early   adventures   of  hunting  and 
fishing,  the   most  pleasant   recollections   of   all 
was  my  boyhood  days  in  my   island    home   on 
the  Kankahee. 

End. 


14  DAY  USE 

RETURN  TO  DESK  FROM  WHICH  BORROWED 

LOAN  DEPT. 

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on  the  date  to  -which  renewed. 

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